Bats (\u3ci\u3eMyotis lucifugus\u3c/i\u3e)

Despite their ecological value, bats (Myotis lucifugus) are relentlessly and unjustifiably persecuted. Bats, the only mammals that truly fly, belong to the order Chiroptera. Bats in North America are virtually all insectivorous, feeding on a variety of flying insects (exceptions among house bats were noted previously). Most North American bats emit high frequency sounds (ultrasound) inaudible to humans and similar to sonar, in order to avoid obstacles, locate and capture insect prey, and to communicate. Bats often fly about swimming pools, from which they drink or catch insects. Bats use roosting niches that are indoors (human dwellings, outbuildings, livestock quarters, warehouses), semi-enclosed (loading docks, entrance foyers), partially sheltered (porches, carports, pavilions, highway underpasses, bridges), and open structural areas (window shutters, signs). Surface areas on walls, under loose woodwork, between bricks and around other bat entryways often have a smooth, polished appearance. Disturbing sounds may be heard from vocalizations and grooming, scratching, crawling, or climbing in attics, under eaves, behind walls, and between floors. Fecal pellets indicate the presence of animals and are found on attic floors, in wall recesses, and outside the house at its base. Several arthropods (fungivores, detritivores, predators, and bat ectoparasites) are often associated with colonies of bats in buildings. Bats are distinct from most vertebrate pests that inhabit human dwellings because of the potential for transmitting rabies — a viral infection of mammals that is usually transmitted via the bite of an infected animal. Rabies is the most important public health hazard associated with bats. The lethal control of bats, even when there is a proven potential danger to humans, often is subjected to careful scrutiny and interagency coordination

Modelagem de preços de provedores de IaaS utilizando regressão múltipla

Uma alternativa para usuários reduzirem custos de aquisição e manutenção de infraestrutura computacional para desenvolver, implementar e executar suas aplicações é a computação em nuvem. Os serviços de computação em nuvem são oferecidos por provedores e podem ser classificados em três modalidades: Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS), Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) e Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS). Em IaaS, os provedores oferecem os serviços divididos em instâncias e o usuário tem à disposição uma máquina virtual com os recursos computacionais que desejar a um determinado valor. O principal desafio enfrentado pelas empresas é escolher, além do provedor, a instância que melhor se adapta as suas necessidades. Frequentemente, estas empresas precisam de uma grande infraestrutura computacional para gerir e aperfeiçoar seus processos de negócio e, diante do alto custo para manter uma infraestrutura local, têm migrado suas aplicações para a nuvem. Este trabalho busca fornecer subsídios capazes de auxiliar as empresas no processo de seleção do melhor provedor/instância para implantar e executar suas soluções de integração na nuvem. Para isso, um estudo preliminar para a elaboração de uma nova proposta de modelagem dos preços das instâncias de máquinas virtuais usando regressão linear é apresentado. Nesta abordagem são considerados os provedores Amazon EC2, Google Compute Engine e Microsoft Windows Azure.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

Evaluation of a new clinical performance assessment tool: A reliability study

Clinical practice is an essential requirement of any graduate physiotherapy programme. For this purpose, valid and reliable assessment tools are paramount for the measurement of key competencies in the real-world setting. This study aims to determine the internal consistency and inter-rater reliability of a newly developed and validated clinical performance assessment form. A cross-sectional quantitative research design was used, which included paired evaluations of 32 (17 treatment and 15 assessment) student examinations performed by two independent clinical educators. Chronbachs alpha was computed to assess internal consistency and intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC’s) with confidence intervals of 95% were computed to determine the percentage agreement between paired examiners. The degree of internal consistency was substantial for all key performance areas of both examinations, except for time and organisational management (0.21) and professionalism (0.42) in the treatment and evaluation examinations respectively. The overall internal consistency was 0.89 and 0.73 for both treatment and assessment examinations, indicating substantial agreement. With regard to agreement between raters, the ICC’s for the overall marks were 0.90 and 0.97 for both treatment and assessment examinations. Clinical educators demonstrated a high level of reliability in the assessment of students’ competence using the newly developed clinical performance assessment form. These findings greatly underscore the reliability of results obtained through observation of student examinations, and add another tool to the basket of ensuring quality assurance in physiotherapy clinical practice assessment

Direct Photons at RHIC

The PHENIX experiment has measured direct photons in $\sqrt{s_{NN}} = 200$ GeV Au+Au collisions and p+p collisions. The fraction of photons due to direct production in Au+Au collisions is shown as a function of $p_T$ and centrality. This measurement is compared with expectation from pQCD calculations. Other possible sources of direct photons are discussed.Comment: 7 pages, 5 figures, presented at Hot Quarks 2004, Taos, N

Precision Masses of the low-mass binary system GJ 623

We have used Aperture Masking Interferometry and Adaptive Optics (AO) at the Palomar 200'' to obtain precise mass measurements of the binary M dwarf GJ 623. AO observations spread over 3 years combined with a decade of radial velocity measurements constrain all orbital parameters of the GJ 623 binary system accurately enough to critically challenge the models. The dynamical masses measured are m_{1}=0.371\pm0.015 M_{\sun} (4%) and m_{2}=0.115\pm0.0023 M_{\sun} (2%) for the primary and the secondary respectively. Models are not consistent with color and mass, requiring very low metallicities.Comment: 7 pages, 5 figures. Accepted for Ap

PHENIX Highlights

Recent highlights of measurements by the PHENIX experiment at RHIC are presented.Comment: 8 pages, 9 figures. Talk at Quark Matter 200

ifCNV: A novel isolation-forest-based package to detect copy-number variations from various targeted NGS datasets

Copy-number variations (CNVs) are an essential component of genetic variation distributed across large parts of the human genome. CNV detection from next-generation sequencing data and artificial intelligence algorithms have progressed in recent years. However, only a few tools have taken advantage of machine-learning algorithms for CNV detection, and none propose using artificial intelligence to automatically detect probable CNV-positive samples. The most developed approach is to use a reference or normal dataset to compare with the samples of interest, and it is well known that selecting appropriate normal samples represents a challenging task that dramatically influences the precision of results in all CNV-detecting tools. With careful consideration of these issues, we propose here ifCNV, a new software based on isolation forests that creates its own reference, available in R and python with customizable parameters. ifCNV combines artificial intelligence using two isolation forests and a comprehensive scoring method to faithfully detect CNVs among various samples. It was validated using targeted next-generation sequencing (NGS) datasets from diverse origins (capture and amplicon, germline and somatic), and it exhibits high sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy. ifCNV is a publicly available open-source software (https://github.com/SimCab-CHU/ifCNV) that allows the detection of CNVs in many clinical situations

Readability and test-retest reliability of a psychometric instrument designed to assess HIV/AIDS attitudes, beliefs, behaviours and sources of HIV prevention information of young adults

Objective: This comparative study evaluated the readability and test-retest reliability of a questionnaire designed to assess the attitudes, beliefs behaviours and sources of information about HIV/AIDS among young adults recruited from universities in the United States of America (USA), Turkey and South Africa. Design/Setting: The instrument was administered on two occasions, within a two week interval, to 219 university students in the USA (n = 66), Turkey (n = 53) and South Africa (n = 100). Method: The psychometric instrument developed has five major subscales: demographic, HIV/AIDS attitudes and beliefs, HIV risk sexual behaviour, alcohol and drug use, and HIV sources of information. Results: The instrument’s readability evaluation revealed a Flesch-Kincaid score (literacy difficulty level of the questionnaire) of 8.4, indicating that respondents would need an eighth grade reading level to understand the survey. The overall test-retest reliability coefficients for the items on the demographic subscale were generally high (0.893–0.997). Similarly, high test-retest reliability was obtained for the HIV risk sexual behaviour (0.738–0.996) and the alcohol and drug use (0.562–1.000) subscales. Much lower test-retest reliability was obtained for the HIV/AIDS attitudes and beliefs (0.32–0.80), and sources of information about HIV/AIDS (0.370–0.892) subscales. Conclusion: We found no discernible difference in the reliability data among the respondents from the three countries. The instrument should be of interest to clinicians and researchers investigating the HIV risk behaviours of young adults and older age groups with an eighth grade reading level. The availability of this instrument may enhance HIV population and intervention studies internationally.Web of Scienc

Students’ views of learning about an interprofessional world café method

BACKGROUND. Interprofessional education (IPE) and practice were conceived as a means to improve quality of care by bringing together the health and social professions to learn and work collaboratively in teams. This collaboration in turn would assist in overcoming negative stereotypes, and promote an understanding and value of the roles of the different professions. OBJECTIVE. To highlight a specific methodology to advance the interprofessional learning of senior students across five disciplines. By sharing the views of students engaged in a world café model of IPE, the authors highlight this strategy as a new concept in instilling core competencies in students. This in turn may assist other higher education institutions in their own processes of creating interprofessional curricula opportunities. METHODS. The participants included senior students from university departments of physiotherapy, oral health, social work, pharmacy and nursing. At the conclusion of the world café sessions, students evaluated the process by means of a questionnaire, using associative group analysis methodology. The responses were analysed into themes according to questions posed to students in an evaluation questionnaire. RESULTS. It was evident that students understood the terminology of IPE and learnt from others in terms of their roles and responsibilities within a team. Overall, students valued the experience; however, they emphasised the need for additional authentic learning opportunities throughout their student training. CONCLUSION. It is evident that although higher education institutions create opportunities for interprofessional learning, similar opportunities need to be provided in the practice setting.DHE

Inherent-Structure Dynamics and Diffusion in Liquids

The self-diffusion constant D is expressed in terms of transitions among the local minima of the potential (inherent structure, IS) and their correlations. The formulae are evaluated and tested against simulation in the supercooled, unit-density Lennard-Jones liquid. The approximation of uncorrelated IS-transition (IST) vectors, D_{0}, greatly exceeds D in the upper temperature range, but merges with simulation at reduced T ~ 0.50. Since uncorrelated IST are associated with a hopping mechanism, the condition D ~ D_{0} provides a new way to identify the crossover to hopping. The results suggest that theories of diffusion in deeply supercooled liquids may be based on weakly correlated IST.Comment: submitted to PR