Innovative librarians: Harnessing passion and involvement for library metamorphosis

During 2010 the RMIT University Library formed the 'Innovative Librarians Group' (ILG). The idea for the ILG was conceived from a debrief meeting with the University Librarian and acting Staff Development Librarian for the group's leader on her return from the Aurora leadership course. The ILG combined her interests in shifting the library staff mindset toward innovation and forward thinking, and integrating a technology focus into the library environment

Modeling Social Transmission Dynamics of Unhealthy Behaviors for Evaluating Prevention and Treatment Interventions on Childhood Obesity

Research evidence indicates that obesity has spread through social networks, but lever points for interventions based on overlapping networks are not well studied. The objective of our research was to construct and parameterize a system dynamics model of the social transmission of behaviors through adult and youth influence in order to explore hypotheses and identify plausible lever points for future childhood obesity intervention research. Our objectives were: (1) to assess the sensitivity of childhood overweight and obesity prevalence to peer and adult social transmission rates, and (2) to test the effect of combinations of prevention and treatment interventions on the prevalence of childhood overweight and obesity. To address the first objective, we conducted two-way sensitivity analyses of adult-to-child and child-to-child social transmission in relation to childhood overweight and obesity prevalence. For the second objective, alternative combinations of prevention and treatment interventions were tested by varying model parameters of social transmission and weight loss behavior rates. Our results indicated child overweight and obesity prevalence might be slightly more sensitive to the same relative change in the adult-to-child compared to the child-to-child social transmission rate. In our simulations, alternatives with treatment alone, compared to prevention alone, reduced the prevalence of childhood overweight and obesity more after 10 years (1.2–1.8% and 0.2–1.0% greater reduction when targeted at children and adults respectively). Also, as the impact of adult interventions on children was increased, the rank of six alternatives that included adults became better (i.e., resulting in lower 10 year childhood overweight and obesity prevalence) than alternatives that only involved children. The findings imply that social transmission dynamics should be considered when designing both prevention and treatment intervention approaches. Finally, targeting adults may be more efficient, and research should strengthen and expand adult-focused interventions that have a high residual impact on children

A direct D-bar reconstruction algorithm for recovering a complex conductivity in 2-D

A direct reconstruction algorithm for complex conductivities in $W^{2,\infty}(\Omega)$, where $\Omega$ is a bounded, simply connected Lipschitz domain in $\mathbb{R}^2$, is presented. The framework is based on the uniqueness proof by Francini [Inverse Problems 20 2000], but equations relating the Dirichlet-to-Neumann to the scattering transform and the exponentially growing solutions are not present in that work, and are derived here. The algorithm constitutes the first D-bar method for the reconstruction of conductivities and permittivities in two dimensions. Reconstructions of numerically simulated chest phantoms with discontinuities at the organ boundaries are included.Comment: This is an author-created, un-copyedited version of an article accepted for publication in [insert name of journal]. IOP Publishing Ltd is not responsible for any errors or omissions in this version of the manuscript or any version derived from it. The Version of Record is available online at 10.1088/0266-5611/28/9/09500

SaludABLEOmaha: Improving Readiness to Address Obesity Through Healthy Lifestyle in a Midwestern Latino Community, 2011–2013

Background A community’s readiness for change is a precursor to the effective application of evidence-based practices for health promotion. Research is lacking regarding potential strategies to improve readiness to address obesity-related health issues in underserved communities. Community Context This case study describes SaludABLEOmaha, an initiative to increase readiness of residents in a Midwestern Latino community to address obesity and adopt healthy lifestyles. Methods SaludABLEOmaha emphasized 2 core approaches, youth activism and collaboration among public and private institutions, which we applied to planning and implementing tactics in support of 3 interconnected strategies: 1) social marketing and social media, 2) service learning in schools (ie, curricula that integrate hands-on community service with instruction and reflection), and 3) community and business engagement. Following the Community Readiness Model protocol (http://triethniccenter.colostate.edu/ communityReadiness.htm), structured interviews were conducted with community leaders and analyzed before and 2.5 years after launch of the program. Outcome The community increased in readiness from stage 3 of the Community Readiness Model, “vague awareness,” at baseline to stage 5, “preparation,” at follow-up. Interpretation SaludABLEOmaha improved community readiness (eg, community knowledge, community climate), which probably contributed to the observed increase in readiness to address obesity through healthy lifestyle. Community mobilization approaches such as youth activism integrated with social marketing and social media tactics can improve community responsiveness to obesity prevention and diminish health disparities

Clinical performance of a novel textile interface for neonatal chest electrical impedance tomography

Objective: Critically ill neonates and infants might particularly benefit from continuous chest electrical impedance tomography (EIT) monitoring at the bedside. In this study a textile 32-electrode interface for neonatal EIT examination has been developed and tested to validate its clinical performance. The objectives were to assess ease of use in a clinical setting, stability of contact impedance at the electrode–skin interface and possible adverse effects. Approach: Thirty preterm infants (gestational age: 30.3 ± 3.9 week (mean ± SD), postnatal age: 13.8 ± 28.2 d, body weight at inclusion: 1727 ± 869 g) were included in this multicentre study. The electrode–skin contact impedances were measured continuously for up to 3 d and analysed during the initial 20-min phase after fastening the belt and during a 10 h measurement interval without any clinical interventions. The skin condition was assessed by attending clinicians. Main results: Our findings imply that the textile electrode interface is suitable for long-term neonatal chest EIT imaging. It does not cause any distress for the preterm infants or discomfort. Stable contact impedance of about 300 Ohm was observed immediately after fastening the electrode belt and during the subsequent 20 min period. A slight increase in contact impedance was observed over time. Tidal variation of contact impedance was less than 5 Ohm. Significance: The availability of a textile 32-electrode belt for neonatal EIT imaging with simple, fast, accurate and reproducible placement on the chest strengthens the potential of EIT to be used for regional lung monitoring in critically ill neonates and infants

Effect of routine suction on lung aeration in critically ill neonates and young infants measured with electrical impedance tomography

oai:repository.mdx.ac.uk:y1752Endotracheal suctioning is a widely used procedure to remove secretions from the airways of ventilated patients. Despite its prevalence, regional effects of this maneuver have seldom been studied. In this study, we explore its effects on regional lung aeration in neonates and young infants using electrical impedance tomography (EIT) as part of the large EU-funded multicenter observational study CRADL. 200 neonates and young infants in intensive care units were monitored with EIT for up to 72 h. EIT parameters were calculated to detect changes in ventilation distribution, ventilation inhomogeneity and ventilation quantity on a breath-by-breath level 5–10 min before and after suctioning. The intratidal change in aeration over time was investigated by means of regional expiratory time constants calculated from all respiratory cycles using an innovative procedure and visualized by 2D maps of the thoracic cross-section. 344 tracheal suctioning events from 51 patients could be analyzed. They showed no or very small changes of EIT parameters, with a dorsal shift of the center of ventilation by 0.5% of the chest diameter and a 7% decrease of tidal impedance variation after suctioning. Regional time constants did not change significantly. Routine suctioning led to EIT- detectable but merely small changes of the ventilation distribution in this study population. While still a measure requiring further study, the time constant maps may help clinicians interpret ventilationmechanics in specific cases

Effect of closed endotracheal suction in high-frequency ventilated premature infants measured with electrical impedance tomography

Objective: To determine the global and regional changes in lung volume during and after closed endotracheal tube (ETT) suction in high-frequency ventilated preterm infants with respiratory distress syndrome (RDS). Design: Prospective observational clinical study. Setting: Neonatal intensive care unit. Patients: Eleven non-muscle relaxed preterm infants with RDS ventilated with open lung high-frequency ventilation (HFV). Interventions: Closed ETT suction. Measurements and results: Changes in global and regional lung volume were measured with electrical impedance tomography. ETT suction resulted in an acute loss of lung volume followed by spontaneous recovery with a median residual loss of 3.3% of the maximum volume loss. The median stabilization time was 8 s. At the regional level, the lung volume changes during and after ETT suction were heterogeneous in nature. Conclusions: Closed ETT suction causes an acute, transient and heterogeneous loss of lung volume in premature infants with RDS treated with open lung HFV

Compressive sensing in electrical impedance tomography for breathing monitoring

Continuous functional thorax monitoring using EIT has been extensively researched. A limiting factor in high temporal resolution, three dimensional, and fast EIT is the handling of the volume of raw impedance data produced for transmission and storage. Owing to the periodicity of breathing that may be reflected in EIT boundary measurements, data dimensionality may be reduced efficiently at the time of sampling using compressed sensing techniques. Measurements using a 32-electrode 48-frame-per-second EIT system from 30 neonates were post-processed to simulate random demodulation acquisition method on 2000 frames for compression ratios (CRs) ranging from 2-100. Sparse reconstruction was performed by solving the basis pursuit problem using SPGL1 package. The global impedance data was used in the subsequent studies. The signal to noise ratio (SNR) for the entire frequency band (0 Hz - 24 Hz) and three local frequency bands were analysed. A breath detection algorithm was applied to traces and the subsequent error-rates were calculated while considering the outcome of the algorithm applied to a down-sampled and linearly interpolated version of the traces as the baseline. SNR degradation was proportional with CR. The mean degradation for 0 Hz - 8 Hz was below ~15 dB for all CRs. The error-rates in the outcome of the breath detection algorithm in the case of decompressed traces were lower than those of the associated down-sampled traces for CR≥25, corresponding to sub-Nyquist rate for breathing. For instance, the mean error-rate associated with CR = 50 was ~60% lower than that of the corresponding down-sampled traces. To the best of our knowledge, no other study has evaluated compressive sensing on boundary impedance data in EIT. While further research should be directed at optimising the acquisition and decompression techniques for this application, this contribution serves as the baseline for future efforts. [Abstract copyright: Creative Commons Attribution license.

Delocalization in the Anderson model due to a local measurement

We study a one-dimensional Anderson model in which one site interacts with a detector monitoring the occupation of that site. We demonstrate that such an interaction, no matter how weak, leads to total delocalization of the Anderson model, and we discuss the experimental consequencesComment: 4 pages, additional explanations added, to appear in Phys. Rev. Let