Are children and dogs best friends? A scoping review to explore the positive and negative effects of child-dog interactions

Personal wellbeing is greatly influenced by our childhood and adolescence, and the relationships formed during those phases of our development. The human-dog bond represents a significant relationship that started thousands of years ago. There is a higher prevalence of dog ownership around the world, especially in households including children. This has resulted in a growing number of researchers studying our interactions with dogs and an expanding evidence base from the exploration of child-dog interactions. We review the potential effects of child-dog interactions on the physical, mental, and social wellbeing of both species. A search of the SCOPUS database identified documents published between January 1980 and April 2022. Filtering for key inclusion criteria, duplicate removals, and inspecting the references of these documents for additional sources, we reviewed a total of 393 documents, 88% of which were scientific articles. We were able to define the numerous ways in which children and dogs interact, be it neutral (e.g., sharing a common area), positive (e.g., petting), or negative (e.g., biting). Then, we found evidence for an association between childhood interaction with dogs and an array of benefits such as increased physical activities, a reduction of stress, and the development of empathy. Nonetheless, several detrimental outcomes have also been identified for both humans and dogs. Children are the most at-risk population regarding dog bites and dog-borne zoonoses, which may lead to injuries/illness, a subsequent fear of dogs, or even death. Moreover, pet bereavement is generally inevitable when living with a canine companion and should not be trivialized. With a canine focus, children sometimes take part in caretaking behaviors toward them, such as feeding or going for walks. These represent opportunities for dogs to relieve themselves outside, but also to exercise and socialize. By contrast, a lack of physical activity can lead to the onset of obesity in both dogs and children. Dogs may present greater levels of stress when in the presence of children. Finally, the welfare of assistance, therapy, and free-roaming dogs who may interact with children remains underexplored. Overall, it appears that the benefits of child-dog interactions outweigh the risks for children but not for dogs; determination of the effects on both species, positive as well as negative, still requires further development. We call for longitudinal studies and cross-cultural research in the future to better understand the impact of child-dog interactions. Our review is important for people in and outside of the scientific community, to pediatricians, veterinarians, and current or future dog owners seeking to extend their knowledge, and to inform future research of scientists studying dogs and human-animal interactions

Melting of Partially Fluorinated Graphene: From Detachment of Fluorine Atoms to Large Defects and Random Coils

The melting of fluorographene is very unusual and depends strongly on the degree of fluorination. For temperatures below 1000 K, fully fluorinated graphene (FFG) is thermo-mechanically more stable than graphene but at T$_m\approx$2800 K FFG transits to random coils which is almost twice lower than the melting temperature of graphene, i.e. 5300 K. For fluorinated graphene (PFG) up to 30 % ripples causes detachment of individual F-atoms around 2000 K while for 40-60 % fluorination, large defects are formed beyond 1500 K and beyond 60% of fluorination F-atoms remain bonded to graphene until melting. The results agree with recent experiments on the dependence of the reversibility of the fluorination process on the percentage of fluorination.Comment: 16 pages, 6 figure

Thermodiffusion in multicomponent n-alkane mixtures

Compositional grading within a mixture has a strong impact on the evaluation of the pre-exploitation distribution of hydrocarbons in underground layers and sediments. Thermodiffusion, which leads to a partial diffusive separation of species in a mixture due to the geothermal gradient, is thought to play an important role in determining the distribution of species in a reservoir. However, despite recent progress, thermodiffusion is still difficult to measure and model in multicomponent mixtures. In this work, we report on experimental investigations of the thermodiffusion of multicomponent n-alkane mixtures at pressure above 30 MPa. The experiments have been conducted in space onboard the Shi Jian 10 spacecraft so as to isolate the studied phenomena from convection. For the two exploitable cells, containing a ternary liquid mixture and a condensate gas, measurements have shown that the lightest and heaviest species had a tendency to migrate, relatively to the rest of the species, to the hot and cold region, respectively. These trends have been confirmed by molecular dynamics simulations. The measured condensate gas data have been used to quantify the influence of thermodiffusion on the initial fluid distribution of an idealised one dimension reservoir. The results obtained indicate that thermodiffusion tends to noticeably counteract the influence of gravitational segregation on the vertical distribution of species, which could result in an unstable fluid column. This confirms that, in oil and gas reservoirs, the availability of thermodiffusion data for multicomponent mixtures is crucial for a correct evaluation of the initial state fluid distribution

WNT signalling in prostate cancer

Genome sequencing and gene expression analyses of prostate tumours have highlighted the potential importance of genetic and epigenetic changes observed in WNT signalling pathway components in prostate tumours-particularly in the development of castration-resistant prostate cancer. WNT signalling is also important in the prostate tumour microenvironment, in which WNT proteins secreted by the tumour stroma promote resistance to therapy, and in prostate cancer stem or progenitor cells, in which WNT-β-catenin signals promote self-renewal or expansion. Preclinical studies have demonstrated the potential of inhibitors that target WNT receptor complexes at the cell membrane or that block the interaction of β-catenin with lymphoid enhancer-binding factor 1 and the androgen receptor, in preventing prostate cancer progression. Some WNT signalling inhibitors are in phase I trials, but they have yet to be tested in patients with prostate cancer

Melting of Partially Fluorinated Graphene: From Detachment of Fluorine Atoms to Large Defects and Random Coils

The melting of fluorographene is very unusual and depends strongly on the degree of fluorination. For temperatures below 1000 K, fully fluorinated graphene (FFG) is thermo-mechanically more stable than graphene but at T m ≈ 2800 K FFG transits to random coils which is almost twice lower than the melting temperature of graphene, i.e. 5300 K. For fluorinated graphene (PFG) up to 30% ripples causes detachment of individual F-atoms around 2000 K while for 40-60% fluorination, large defects are formed beyond 1500 K and beyond 60% of fluorination F-atoms remain bonded to graphene until melting. The results agree with recent experiments on the dependence of the reversibility of the fluorination process on the percentage of fluorination.Fil: Singh, Sandeep Kumar. Universiteit Antwerpen. Department of Physics; BélgicaFil: Costamagna, Sebastian. Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas. Centro Científico Tecnológico Rosario. Instituto de Física de Rosario (i); Argentina. Universidad Nacional de Rosario. Facultad de Ciencias Exactas, Ingeniería y Agrimensura; ArgentinaFil: Neek Amal, M.. Universiteit Antwerpen. Department of Physics; BélgicaFil: Peeters, F. M.. Universiteit Antwerpen. Department of Physics; Bélgic

European Space Agency experiments on thermodiffusion of fluid mixtures in space

Abstract.: This paper describes the European Space Agency (ESA) experiments devoted to study thermodiffusion of fluid mixtures in microgravity environment, where sedimentation and convection do not affect the mass flow induced by the Soret effect. First, the experiments performed on binary mixtures in the IVIDIL and GRADFLEX experiments are described. Then, further experiments on ternary mixtures and complex fluids performed in DCMIX and planned to be performed in the context of the NEUF-DIX project are presented. Finally, multi-component mixtures studied in the SCCO project are detailed

Genetic Dissection of the Function of Hindbrain Axonal Commissures

The Robo3 receptor controls midline crossing by axons. Deleting Robo3 in specific commissural neurons with a conditional knockout reveals their contribution to sensory and motor integration, and models human neurological conditions