21st century social work: reducing re-offending - key practice skills

This literature review was commissioned by the Scottish Executive’s Social Work Services Inspectorate in order to support the work of the 21st Century Social Work Review Group. Discussions in relation to the future arrangements for criminal justice social work raised issues about which disciplines might best encompass the requisite skills for reducing re-offending in the community. Rather than starting with what is known or understood about the skills of those professionals currently involved in such interventions, this study sought to start with the research evidence on effective work with offenders to reduce re-offending and then work its way back to the skills required to promote this outcome

Motor control in people with low back pain : the effects of pain, exercise, and a simulated round of golf

Low back pain is considered a multifactorial condition, with biological and psychosocial features contributing to symptoms. Contemporary theories on motor adaptations to pain implicate altered motor control as a biological feature that contributes to the onset, recurrence, and persistence of low back pain. Unsurprisingly, ameliorating altered motor control is a target for some therapeutic interventions for people with low back pain. However, whether motor control is consistently altered in the presence of low back pain is unclear. In addition, motor control improvements following exercise in people with low back pain are conflicting when examined using muscle onsets, yet few studies have examined changes in other motor control measures. Finally, despite contemporary theories suggesting altered motor control contributes to symptom recurrence, there is currently a paucity of evidence observing altered motor control leading to symptom exacerbation during ecologically valid tasks. To address these gaps in the literature, a series of studies were conducted. This thesis therefore investigated: (1) is motor control consistently altered in the presence of low back pain based on measures of anticipatory and compensatory postural adjustments? (2) Do commonly prescribed exercise interventions improve motor control in people with low back pain based on anticipatory and compensatory postural adjustments? And (3) do golfers with low back pain exhibit altered motor control during the golf downswing and are these alterations accompanied by an exacerbation of low back pain? The findings of this thesis improve our understanding of the role of motor control alterations in people with LBP. This thesis provides support for contemporary theoretical models of altered motor control in people with LBP, suggesting altered motor control is a feature of LBP. This thesis provides support for exercise interventions that aim to improve trunk motor control in people with LBP. An interesting finding was the reduction in EO activity which was accompanied by increased trunk deviation phase and X-factor variables — recorded during the golf swing — over the course of a simulated round of golf in golfers with LBP. This finding suggests the adoption of a “loose” motor control strategy. However, the adoption of a “loose” motor control strategy was not accompanied by subsequent pain provocation, which challenges the proposed causal relationship between altered motor control and pain

Extreme ultraviolet and X-ray spectroheliograph for OSO-H

A complex scientific instrument was designed, fabricated, tested, and calibrated for launch onboard OSO-H. This instrument consisted of four spectroheliographs and an X-ray polarimeter. The instrument is designed to study solar radiation at selected wavelengths in the X-ray and the extreme ultraviolet ranges, make observations at the H-alpha wavelength, and measure the degree of polarization of X-ray emissions

Assessment of Neuropsychological Trajectories in Longitudinal Population-Based Studies of Children

This paper provides a strategy for the assessment of brain function in longitudinal cohort studies of children. The proposed strategy invokes both domain-specific and omnibus intelligence test approaches. In order to minimise testing burden and practice effects, the cohort is divided into four groups with one-quarter tested at 6-monthly intervals in the 0–2-year age range (at ages 6 months, 1.0, 1.5 and 2.0 years) and at annual intervals from ages 3–20 (one-quarter of the children at age 3, another at age 4, etc). This strategy allows investigation of cognitive development and of the relationship between environmental influences and development at each age. It also allows introduction of new domains of function when age-appropriate. As far as possible, tests are used that will provide a rich source of both longitudinal and cross-sectional data. The testing strategy allows the introduction of novel tests and new domains as well as piloting of tests when the test burden is relatively light. In addition to the recommended tests for each age and domain, alternative tests are described. Assessment methodology and knowledge about child cognitive development will change over the next 20 years, and strategies are suggested for altering the proposed test schedule as appropriate

Fluorescence Correlation Spectroscopy Reveals Efficient Cytosolic Delivery of Protein Cargo by Cell-Permeant Miniature Proteins.

New methods for delivering proteins into the cytosol of mammalian cells are being reported at a rapid pace. Differentiating between these methods in a quantitative manner is difficult, however, as most assays for evaluating cytosolic protein delivery are qualitative and indirect and thus often misleading. Here we make use of fluorescence correlation spectroscopy (FCS) to determine with precision and accuracy the relative efficiencies with which seven different previously reported "cell-penetrating peptides" (CPPs) transport a model protein cargo-the self-labeling enzyme SNAP-tag-beyond endosomal membranes and into the cytosol. Using FCS, we discovered that the miniature protein ZF5.3 is an exceptional vehicle for delivering SNAP-tag to the cytosol. When delivered by ZF5.3, SNAP-tag can achieve a cytosolic concentration as high as 250 nM, generally at least 2-fold and as much as 6-fold higher than any other CPP evaluated. Additionally, we show that ZF5.3 can be fused to a second enzyme cargo-the engineered peroxidase APEX2-and reliably delivers the active enzyme to the cell interior. As FCS allows one to realistically assess the relative merits of protein transduction domains, we anticipate that it will greatly accelerate the identification, evaluation, and optimization of strategies to deliver large, intact proteins to intracellular locales

Incorporating Environmental Impacts in the Measurement of Agricultural Productivity Growth

Agricultural production is known to have environmental impacts, both adverse and beneficial, and it is desirable to incorporate at least some of these impacts in an environmentally sensitive productivity index. In this paper, we construct indicators of water contamination from the use of agricultural chemicals. These environmental indicators are merged with data on marketed outputs and purchased inputs to form a state-by-year panel of relative levels of outputs and inputs, including environmental impacts. We do not have prices for these undesirable by products, since they are not marketed. Consequently, we calculate a series of Malmquist productivity indexes, which do not require price information. Our benchmark scenario is a conventional Malmquist productivity index based on marketed outputs and purchased inputs only. Our comparison scenarios consist of environmentally sensitive Malmquist productivity indexes that include indicators of risk to human health and to aquatic life from chronic exposure to pesticides. In addition, we derive a set of virtual prices of the undesirable by-products that can be used to calculate an environmentally sensitive Fisher index of productivity change.environmental impacts, productivity growth, Environmental Economics and Policy,

Slave-boson field fluctuation approach to the extended Falicov-Kimball model: charge, orbital, and excitonic susceptibilities

Based on the SO(2)-invariant slave-boson scheme, the static charge, orbital, and excitonic susceptibilities in the extended Falicov-Kimball model are calculated. Analyzing the phase without long-range order we find instabilities towards charge order, orbital order, and the excitonic insulator (EI) phase. The instability towards the EI is in agreement with the saddle-point phase diagram. We also evaluate the dynamic excitonic susceptibility, which allows the investigation of uncondensed excitons. We find qualitatively different features of the exciton dispersion at the semimetal-EI and at the semiconductor-EI transition supporting a crossover scenario between a BCS-type electron-hole condensation and a Bose-Einstein condensation of preformed bound electron-hole pairs.Comment: 8 pages, 9 figures, final versio

Classification of Bats

In the 10th edition of Systema Naturae, published in 1758 and the starting point of the binomial system of nomenclature currently employed in zoology, Linnaeus recognized seven species of bats, which he placed in a single genus (Vespertilio) and grouped with the primates and dermopterans. All of Linnaeus\u27s seven species are recognized today, but as they now are classified each represents a distinctive genus, and the genera are arranged taxonomically in five different families of two suborders. In contrast to Linnaeus\u27s scheme, the present classification of bats (long ago placed in a distinct order, Chiroptera) lists 847 Recent species, belonging to 169 Recent genera, 15 families (at least three other families are known only as fossils), and two suborders (see Table 1). Much work remains in elucidating the relationships of bats, even at the higher taxonomic levels. In the plethora of publications that have appeared in recent years on the distribution and systematics of bat genera and species, the trend has been to reduce the number of recognized taxa at these levels, even though some new species, and occasionally a new genus, are named annually. Several of the subsequent papers in this symposium touch on problems relating to classification