Continental breakup and UHP rock exhumation in action: GPS results from the Woodlark Rift, Papua New Guinea

We show results from a network of campaign Global Positioning System (GPS) sites in the Woodlark Rift, southeastern Papua New Guinea, in a transition from seafloor spreading to continental rifting. GPS velocities indicate anticlockwise rotation (at 2–2.7°/Myr, relative to Australia) of crustal blocks north of the rift, producing 10–15 mm/yr of extension in the continental rift, increasing to 20–40 mm/yr of seafloor spreading at the Woodlark Spreading Center. Extension in the continental rift is distributed among multiple structures. These data demonstrate that low-angle normal faults in the continents, such as the Mai'iu Fault, can slip at high rates nearing 10 mm/yr. Extensional deformation observed in the D'Entrecasteaux Islands, the site of the world's only actively exhuming Ultra-High Pressure (UHP) rock terrane, supports the idea that extensional processes play a critical role in UHP rock exhumation. GPS data do not require significant interseismic coupling on faults in the region, suggesting that much of the deformation may be aseismic. Westward transfer of deformation from the Woodlark Spreading Center to the main plate boundary fault in the continental rift (the Mai'iu fault) is accommodated by clockwise rotation of a tectonic block beneath Goodenough Bay, and by dextral strike slip on transfer faults within (and surrounding) Normanby Island. Contemporary extension rates in the Woodlark Spreading Center are 30–50% slower than those from seafloor spreading-derived magnetic anomalies. The 0.5 Ma to present seafloor spreading estimates for the Woodlark Basin may be overestimated, and a reevaluation of these data in the context of the GPS rates is warranted

Cloud System Evolution in the Trades (CSET): Following the Evolution of Boundary Layer Cloud Systems with the NSFNCAR GV

The Cloud System Evolution in the Trades (CSET) study was designed to describe and explain the evolution of the boundary layer aerosol, cloud, and thermodynamic structures along trajectories within the North Pacific trade winds. The study centered on seven round trips of the National Science FoundationNational Center for Atmospheric Research (NSFNCAR) Gulfstream V (GV) between Sacramento, California, and Kona, Hawaii, between 7 July and 9 August 2015. The CSET observing strategy was to sample aerosol, cloud, and boundary layer properties upwind from the transition zone over the North Pacific and to resample these areas two days later. Global Forecast System forecast trajectories were used to plan the outbound flight to Hawaii with updated forecast trajectories setting the return flight plan two days later. Two key elements of the CSET observing system were the newly developed High-Performance Instrumented Airborne Platform for Environmental Research (HIAPER) Cloud Radar (HCR) and the high-spectral-resolution lidar (HSRL). Together they provided unprecedented characterizations of aerosol, cloud, and precipitation structures that were combined with in situ measurements of aerosol, cloud, precipitation, and turbulence properties. The cloud systems sampled included solid stratocumulus infused with smoke from Canadian wildfires, mesoscale cloudprecipitation complexes, and patches of shallow cumuli in very clean environments. Ultraclean layers observed frequently near the top of the boundary layer were often associated with shallow, optically thin, layered veil clouds. The extensive aerosol, cloud, drizzle, and boundary layer sampling made over open areas of the northeast Pacific along 2-day trajectories during CSET will be an invaluable resource for modeling studies of boundary layer cloud system evolution and its governing physical processes

Standardized Urine-Based Tuberculosis (TB) Screening With TB-Lipoarabinomannan and Xpert MTB/RIF Ultra in Ugandan Adults With Advanced Human Immunodeficiency Virus Disease and Suspected Meningitis.

BACKGROUND: Diagnosis of extrapulmonary tuberculosis (TB) remains challenging. We sought to determine the prevalence of disseminated TB by testing urine with TB-lipoarabinomannan (TB-LAM) lateral flow assay and Xpert MTB/RIF Ultra (Ultra) in hospitalized adults. METHODS: We prospectively enrolled human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-positive adults with suspected meningitis in Uganda during 2018-2020. Participants underwent standardized urine-based TB screening. Urine (60 mcL) was tested with TB-LAM (Alere), and remaining urine was centrifuged with the cell pellet resuspended in 2 mL of urine for Xpert Ultra testing. RESULTS: We enrolled 348 HIV-positive inpatients with median CD4 of 37 cells/mcL (interquartile range, 13-102 cells/mcL). Overall, 26% (90 of 348; 95% confidence interval [CI], 21%-30%) had evidence of disseminated TB by either urine assay. Of 243 participants with both urine TB-LAM and Ultra results, 20% (48 of 243) were TB-LAM-positive, 12% (29 of 243) were Ultra-positive, and 6% (14 of 243) were positive by both assays. In definite and probable TB meningitis, 37% (14 of 38) were TB-LAM-positive and 41% (15 of 37) were Ultra-positive. In cryptococcal meningitis, 22% (40 of 183) were TB-LAM-positive and 4.4% (6 of 135) were Ultra-positive. Mortality trended higher in those with evidence of disseminated TB by either assay (odds ratio = 1.44; 95% CI, 0.83-2.49; P = .19) and was 6-fold higher in those with definite TB meningitis who were urine Ultra-positive (odds ratio = 5.67; 95% CI, 1.13-28.5; P = .04). CONCLUSIONS: In hospitalized Ugandans with advanced HIV disease and suspected meningitis, systematic screening with urine TB-LAM and Ultra found a high prevalence of urine TB test positivity (26%). In those with TB meningitis, urine tests were positive in over one third. There was little concordance between Ultra and TB-LAM, which warrants further investigation

Prior upregulation of interferon pathways in the nasopharynx impacts viral shedding following live attenuated influenza vaccine challenge in children.

In children lacking influenza-specific adaptive immunity, upper respiratory tract innate immune responses may influence viral replication and disease outcome. We use trivalent live attenuated influenza vaccine (LAIV) as a surrogate challenge model in children aged 24-59 months to identify pre-infection mucosal transcriptomic signatures associated with subsequent viral shedding. Upregulation of interferon signaling pathways prior to LAIV is significantly associated with lower strain-specific viral loads (VLs) at days 2 and 7. Several interferon-stimulated genes are differentially expressed in children with pre-LAIV asymptomatic respiratory viral infections and negatively correlated with LAIV VLs. Upregulation of genes enriched in macrophages, neutrophils, and eosinophils is associated with lower VLs and found more commonly in children with asymptomatic viral infections. Variability in pre-infection mucosal interferon gene expression in children may impact the course of subsequent influenza infections. This variability may be due to frequent respiratory viral infections, demonstrating the potential importance of mucosal virus-virus interactions in children

Criminology or Zemiology? Yes, please! on the refusal of choice between false alternatives

Buried deep within the zemiological movement and its supportive literature is the implicit assumption that the word zemia, the organising concept around which zemiology is built, simply represents ‘the Greek word for harm’. This interpretation has supported numerous drives to ‘move beyond criminology’ and erect strict borders between the study of crime and harm. However, a deeper, albeit still rather brief, exploration of zemia reveals that it possesses a broader range of meaning than that commonly afforded to it. By beginning to unpick zemia’s semantic genealogy, it appears that the conventional use of the word to support the imposition of false alternatives between criminology and zemiology is untenable. Accordingly, this chapter attempts to foreground a more integrated approach to the study of crime and harm

History, Commemoration, and Belief: Abraham Lincoln in American Memory, 1945-2001

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/91765/1/Schuman-History_Commemoration_Belief.pd

Multiple novel prostate cancer susceptibility signals identified by fine-mapping of known risk loci among Europeans

Genome-wide association studies (GWAS) have identified numerous common prostate cancer (PrCa) susceptibility loci. We have fine-mapped 64 GWAS regions known at the conclusion of the iCOGS study using large-scale genotyping and imputation in 25 723 PrCa cases and 26 274 controls of European ancestry. We detected evidence for multiple independent signals at 16 regions, 12 of which contained additional newly identified significant associations. A single signal comprising a spectrum of correlated variation was observed at 39 regions; 35 of which are now described by a novel more significantly associated lead SNP, while the originally reported variant remained as the lead SNP only in 4 regions. We also confirmed two association signals in Europeans that had been previously reported only in East-Asian GWAS. Based on statistical evidence and linkage disequilibrium (LD) structure, we have curated and narrowed down the list of the most likely candidate causal variants for each region. Functional annotation using data from ENCODE filtered for PrCa cell lines and eQTL analysis demonstrated significant enrichment for overlap with bio-features within this set. By incorporating the novel risk variants identified here alongside the refined data for existing association signals, we estimate that these loci now explain ∼38.9% of the familial relative risk of PrCa, an 8.9% improvement over the previously reported GWAS tag SNPs. This suggests that a significant fraction of the heritability of PrCa may have been hidden during the discovery phase of GWAS, in particular due to the presence of multiple independent signals within the same regio

Fulminant corticobasal degeneration: a distinct variant with predominant neuronal tau aggregates.

Corticobasal degeneration typically progresses gradually over 5-7 years from onset till death. Fulminant corticobasal degeneration cases with a rapidly progressive course were rarely reported (RP-CBD). This study aimed to investigate their neuropathological characteristics. Of the 124 autopsy-confirmed corticobasal degeneration cases collected from 14 centres, we identified 6 RP-CBD cases (4.8%) who died of advanced disease within 3 years of onset. These RP-CBD cases had different clinical phenotypes including rapid global cognitive decline (N = 2), corticobasal syndrome (N = 2) and Richardson's syndrome (N = 2). We also studied four corticobasal degeneration cases with an average disease duration of 3 years or less, who died of another unrelated illness (Intermediate-CBD). Finally, we selected 12 age-matched corticobasal degeneration cases out of a cohort of 110, who had a typical gradually progressive course and reached advanced clinical stage (End-stage-CBD). Quantitative analysis showed high overall tau burden (p = 0.2) and severe nigral cell loss (p = 0.47) in both the RP-CBD and End-stage-CBD groups consistent with advanced pathological changes, while the Intermediate-CBD group (mean disease duration = 3 years) had milder changes than End-stage-CBD (p < 0.05). These findings indicated that RP-CBD cases had already developed advanced pathological changes as those observed in End-stage-CBD cases (mean disease duration = 6.7 years), but within a significantly shorter duration (2.5 years; p < 0.001). Subgroup analysis was performed to investigate the cellular patterns of tau aggregates in the anterior frontal cortex and caudate by comparing neuronal-to-astrocytic plaque ratios between six RP-CBD cases, four Intermediate-CBD and 12 age-matched End-stage-CBD. Neuronal-to-astrocytic plaque ratios of Intermediate-CBD and End-stage-CBD, but not RP-CBD, positively correlated with disease duration in both the anterior frontal cortex and caudate (p = 0.02). In contrast to the predominance of astrocytic plaques we previously reported in preclinical asymptomatic corticobasal degeneration cases, neuronal tau aggregates predominated in RP-CBD exceeding those in Intermediate-CBD (anterior frontal cortex: p < 0.001, caudate: p = 0.001) and End-stage-CBD (anterior frontal cortex: p = 0.03, caudate: p = 0.01) as demonstrated by its higher neuronal-to-astrocytic plaque ratios in both anterior frontal cortex and caudate. We did not identify any difference in age at onset, any pathogenic tau mutation or concomitant pathologies that could have contributed to the rapid progression of these RP-CBD cases. Mild TDP-43 pathology was observed in three RP-CBD cases. All RP-CBD cases were men. The MAPT H2 haplotype, known to be protective, was identified in one RP-CBD case (17%) and 8 of the matched End-stage-CBD cases (67%). We conclude that RP-CBD is a distinct aggressive variant of corticobasal degeneration with characteristic neuropathological substrates resulting in a fulminant disease process as evident both clinically and pathologically. Biological factors such as genetic modifiers likely play a pivotal role in the RP-CBD variant and should be the subject of future research

The Science Performance of JWST as Characterized in Commissioning

This paper characterizes the actual science performance of the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), as determined from the six month commissioning period. We summarize the performance of the spacecraft, telescope, science instruments, and ground system, with an emphasis on differences from pre-launch expectations. Commissioning has made clear that JWST is fully capable of achieving the discoveries for which it was built. Moreover, almost across the board, the science performance of JWST is better than expected; in most cases, JWST will go deeper faster than expected. The telescope and instrument suite have demonstrated the sensitivity, stability, image quality, and spectral range that are necessary to transform our understanding of the cosmos through observations spanning from near-earth asteroids to the most distant galaxies.Comment: 5th version as accepted to PASP; 31 pages, 18 figures; https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1538-3873/acb29