A Dialogue on the Demise of Collegiate Aviation Programs

When I heard of the email correspondence between Dr. Foster and Professor Smith, I approached them with the proposal to publish their dialogue about Professor Smith\u27s piece on the demise of collegiate aviation programs Smith (2002, p. 13-14). I felt this is a good example of how the Forum encourages collegial discussion, debate and helpful interaction. The discussion is interesting regarding the schism between teaching ideals and the realities of traditional academic programs. Dr. Foster\u27s questions are in regular font. Professor Smith\u27s replies are italicized. Both have a summary at the end. (Ed.

Bump start needed: linking guidelines, policy and practice in promoting physical activity during and beyond pregnancy

First paragraph: There is compelling evidence that regular physical activity (PA) during pregnancy benefits both mother and baby.1 2 Notably, physical and psychological benefits are evident in the literature, such as marked reductions in the development of gestational diabetes and hypertensive disorders, alongside improvements in depressive symptoms and cardiorespiratory fitness.1 2 The evidence base has been reflected by recent policy initiatives, for example, in 2017 (relaunched in 2019), the UK‘s chief medical officers (CMOs) published PA guidelines for pregnant women, which made substantial strides in unifying and translating the evidence into recommendations.1 The CMO guidelines are aimed at supporting health professionals to provide consistent, evidence-based PA messages to women throughout pregnancy.1 Recently, the Chartered Institute for the Management of Sport and Physical Activity have updated their professional standards for working with antenatal and postnatal clients to align with these CMO guidelines.3 However, not all women have access to professionals with this level of expertise and training, potentially limiting the impact of the CMO guidelines

In Vitro HPV-11 Infection of Human Foreskin

Study of the infectious process of human papillomavirus type 11 (HPV-11) has been facilitated by the discovery that HPV- 11 – infected neonatal human foreskin epithelium can proliferate as xenografts into condyloma-like growths within athymic nude mice. Here we describe detection of HPV-1 1 infection of neonatal human foreskin-derived keratinocytes, infected and cultured entirely in vitro, by use of the polymerase chain reaction and primers straddling the splice donor/ acceptor site of the most prevalent early gene HPV-11 transcript (E1∧E4). Expression of the E1∧E4 HPV-11 mRNA is abrogated by 60°C heat inactivation of the inoculum. HPV- 11 – infected foreskin explants continue to produce the E1∧E4 mRNA for up to 5 weeks in culture, and second-passage keratinocytes derived from infected explant outgrowths continue to produce the E1∧E4 mRNA. The in vitro system described here provides a new way to study HPV-11 infection and may be useful in evaluating early events of infection

454-Pyrosequencing: A Molecular Battiscope for Freshwater Viral Ecology

Viruses, the most abundant biological entities on the planet, are capable of infecting organisms from all three branches of life, although the majority infect bacteria where the greatest degree of cellular diversity lies. However, the characterization and assessment of viral diversity in natural environments is only beginning to become a possibility. Through the development of a novel technique for the harvest of viral DNA and the application of 454 pyrosequencing, a snapshot of the diversity of the DNA viruses harvested from a standing pond on a cattle farm has been obtained. A high abundance of viral genotypes (785) were present within the virome. The absolute numbers of lambdoid and Shiga toxin (Stx) encoding phages detected suggested that the depth of sequencing had enabled recovery of only ca. 8% of the total virus population, numbers that agreed within less than an order of magnitude with predictions made by rarefaction analysis. The most abundant viral genotypes in the pond were bacteriophages (93.7%). The predominant viral genotypes infecting higher life forms found in association with the farm were pathogens that cause disease in cattle and humans, e.g. members of the Herpesviridae. The techniques and analysis described here provide a fresh approach to the monitoring of viral populations in the aquatic environment, with the potential to become integral to the development of risk analysis tools for monitoring the dissemination of viral agents of animal, plant and human diseases

Cross-Resistance and Resistance Longevity as Induced by Bean Leaf Beetle, Cerotoma trifurcata and Soybean Looper, Pseudoplusia includens herbivory on Soybean

Cross-resistance, and longevity of resistance, induced by the bean leaf beetle, Cerotoma trifurcata, was studied IN the soybean PI 227687 that exhibited induced response in earlier studies. Bean leaf beetle adults and soybean looper, Pseudoplusia includens, larvae were used to induce resistance and to determine beetle feeding preference. Beetles were collected from soybean fields 2 to 5 days prior to the feeding preference test. The level of cross-resistance induced by soybean looper herbivory to subsequent bean leaf beetle feeding was higher when compared to cross-resistance induced by bean leaf beetle herbivory against subsequent feeding by soybean looper. Further, herbivory by the bean leaf beetle also induced resistance against soybean looper feeding. In the longevity study, leaflets from treated plants were collected 5, 10, 12, 14, 16, 20 and 25 days after initiation of feeding. Pairwise comparisons of leaflets from plants treated by bean leaf beetle herbivory with untreated plants revealed that induced responses were highest 14 and lowest 25 days after initiation of feeding. On other sampling days, levels of induced response varied with the sampling day

Time evolution and squeezing of the field amplitude in cavity QED

We present the conditional time evolution of the electromagnetic field produced by a cavity QED system in the strongly coupled regime. We obtain the conditional evolution through a wave-particle correlation function that measures the time evolution of the field after the detection of a photon. A connection exists between this correlation function and the spectrum of squeezing which permits the study of squeezed states in the time domain. We calculate the spectrum of squeezing from the master equation for the reduced density matrix using both the quantum regression theorem and quantum trajectories. Our calculations not only show that spontaneous emission degrades the squeezing signal, but they also point to the dynamical processes that cause this degradation.Comment: 12 pages. Submitted to JOSA

Multiparametric Cardiac 18F-FDG PET in Humans: Kinetic Model Selection and Identifiability Analysis

Cardiac 18F-FDG PET has been used in clinics to assess myocardial glucose metabolism. Its ability for imaging myocardial glucose transport, however, has rarely been exploited in clinics. Using the dynamic FDG-PET scans of ten patients with coronary artery disease, we investigate in this paper appropriate dynamic scan and kinetic modeling protocols for efficient quantification of myocardial glucose transport. Three kinetic models and the effect of scan duration were evaluated by using statistical fit quality, assessing the impact on kinetic quantification, and analyzing the practical identifiability. The results show that the kinetic model selection depends on the scan duration. The reversible two-tissue model was needed for a one-hour dynamic scan. The irreversible two-tissue model was optimal for a scan duration of around 10 minutes. If the scan duration was shortened to 2 minutes, a one-tissue model was the most appropriate. For global quantification of myocardial glucose transport, we demonstrated that an early dynamic scan with a duration of 10 minutes and irreversible kinetic modeling was comparable to the full one-hour scan with reversible kinetic modeling. Myocardial glucose transport quantification provides an additional physiological parameter on top of the existing assessment of glucose metabolism, which may be used as a surrogate of myocardial blood flow to enable single tracer multiparametric imaging in the myocardium.Comment: 10 pages, 8 figure