Assessing the Oral Health Needs of Public Housing Residents

Objectives: “Tooth Smart Healthy Start” is a randomized clinical trial which aims to reduce the incidence of early childhood caries (ECC) in Boston public housing residents as part of the NIH funded Northeast Center for Research to Evaluate and Eliminate Dental Disparities. The purpose of this project was to assess public housing stakeholders' perception of the oral health needs of public housing residents and their interest in replicating “Tooth Smart Healthy Start” in other public housing sites across the nation. Methods: The target population was the 180 attendees of the 2010 meeting of the Health Care for Residents of Public Housing National Conference. A ten question survey which assessed conference attendees' beliefs about oral health and its importance to public housing residents was distributed. Data was analyzed using SAS 9.1. Descriptive statistics were calculated for each variable and results were stratified by participants' roles. Results: Thirty percent of conference attendees completed the survey. The participants consisted of residents, agency representatives, and housing authority personnel. When asked to rank health issues facing public housing residents, oral health was rated as most important (42%) or top three (16%) by residents. The agency representatives and housing authority personnel rated oral health among the top three (33% and 58% respectively) and top five (36% and 25% respectively). When participants ranked the three greatest resident health needs out of eight choices, oral health was the most common response. Majority of the participants expressed interest in replicating the “Tooth Smart Healthy Start” program at their sites. Conclusion: All stakeholder groups identified oral health as one of the greatest health needs of residents in public housing. Furthermore, if shown to reduce ECC, there is significant interest in implementing the program amongst key public housing stakeholders across the nation.NIDCR U54 DE019275 and K24 DE00041

Every High Has a Low: A Pragmatic Approach to the War on Drugs

One of the lasting vestiges of Richard Nixon’s presidency is the infamous “War on Drugs,” a forty-year-old effort aimed at curtailing “illicit drug consumption and transactions in America.” Although the goal behind the policy—a reduction in the rate of substance abuse—may be altruistic, the War on Drugs has dismally failed to achieve its goals and has exacerbated existing problems. Specifically, laws dealing with crack cocaine result in a “heavily disproportionate impact on black defendants;” in 2008 “blacks comprised 79.8 percent of those convicted for crack cocaine-related offenses,” whereas “whites comprised only 10.4 percent.” More generally, these laws illustrate a fundamental misconception of the chief cause of drug abuse and the necessary remedial measures. The best solution to achieve the goals of the United States’ War on Drugs is to mimic Portugal’s and Sweden’s approach to combating drug abuse

Old Habits Die Hard: Disengaging from the Bluebook

Incoming first-year law students dread many aspects of what lies ahead: the cold calls, the challenging course load, and the general stress that is associated with starting a new phase in one’s life. Most students, however, do not expect that the Bluebook—the citation system used ubiquitously throughout the legal landscape—will inflict “more pain” on them “than any other publication in legal history.” This pain might be a shock to many who are accustomed to the simpler systems utilized in other academic fields. A citation itself is, after all, merely a reference; it is “neither scholarship nor analysis.” Preferably, a system of citations needs to be simple and functional so as to not distract the reader from paying attention to the author’s reasoning. The Bluebook’s “complexity and insularity” made it anathema to many lawyers and stirred up significant criticism. This Comment will explore the current rationales for the Bluebook’s eminence, followed by a discussion of the Bluebook’s many shortcomings. Finally, it will propose a pragmatic alternative to the Bluebook that will satisfy the need for a useful system of citation without any of the tangential headaches

Old Habits Die Hard: Disengaging from the Bluebook

Incoming first-year law students dread many aspects of what lies ahead: the cold calls, the challenging course load, and the general stress that is associated with starting a new phase in one’s life. Most students, however, do not expect that the Bluebook—the citation system used ubiquitously throughout the legal landscape—will inflict “more pain” on them “than any other publication in legal history.” This pain might be a shock to many who are accustomed to the simpler systems utilized in other academic fields. A citation itself is, after all, merely a reference; it is “neither scholarship nor analysis.” Preferably, a system of citations needs to be simple and functional so as to not distract the reader from paying attention to the author’s reasoning. The Bluebook’s “complexity and insularity” made it anathema to many lawyers and stirred up significant criticism. This Comment will explore the current rationales for the Bluebook’s eminence, followed by a discussion of the Bluebook’s many shortcomings. Finally, it will propose a pragmatic alternative to the Bluebook that will satisfy the need for a useful system of citation without any of the tangential headaches

Transition Radiation by Neutrinos

We calculate the transition radiation process $\nu \to \nu \gamma$ at an interface of two media. The neutrinos are taken to be with only standard-model couplings. The medium fulfills the dual purpose of inducing an effective neutrino-photon vertex and of modifying the photon dispersion relation. The transition radiation occurs when at least one of those quantities have different values in different media. The neutrino mass is ignored due to its negligible contribution. We present a result for the probability of the transition radiation which is both accurate and analytic. For $E_\nu =1$ MeV neutrino crossing polyethylene-vacuum interface the transition radiation probability is about $10^{-39}$ and the energy intensity is about $10^{-34}$ eV. At the surface of the neutron stars the transition radiation probability may be $\sim 10^{-20}$. Our result on three orders of magnitude is larger than the results of previous calculations

Resonant Diffraction Radiation and Smith-Purcell Effect

An approach has been developed where the Smith-Purcell radiation (SPR), i.e. emission of electrons moving close to a periodic structure, is treated as the resonant diffraction radiation. Simple formulas have been designed for the SPR intensity for a grating having perfectly conducting strips spaced by a vacuum gap. The results have been compared with those obtained via other techniques. It has been shown that the intensity of radiation for the said gratings for a relativistic case sufficiently exceeds the SPR intensity for the grating made up by a periodically deformed continuous surface.Comment: 9 pages, LATEX, 3 Postscript figures, uses epsf.sty, submitted to Phys.Letters

Quantum theory of transition radiation and transition pair creation

Theory of the transition radiation and the transition pair creation is developed in the frame of QED. The spectral-angular distributions of probability of the transition radiation and of the transition pair creation are found. The total energy losses of and the total probability of pair creation are calculated and analyzed. Features of radiation and pair creation processes in a superdence medium (typical for white dwarfs) are discussed.Comment: LaTeX, 12 pages, 3 eps figure

Transition radiation as a source of quasi-monochromatic X-rays

Transition radiation (TR) from ultrarelativistic particles is considered. It is shown that performing collimation of the TR from the periodic N-foil stack (parameters of which are selected in a appropriate manner) one obtains the spectrum of the TR which has a form of a peak position of which $\omega_1$ depends on the plasma frequency and the thickness of the radiator foils. The height and width of the peak depend on the collimation angle $\vartheta_c$. The height of the peak for given $\vartheta_c$ is proportional to N. Selecting parameters one can have the source of X-rays of desired frequency with rather good monochromaticity.Comment: LaTeX 2.09, 12 pages, 3 eps figure

Interactions between xylotrophic mushrooms and mycoparasitic fungi in dual culture experiments

Seventeen wood-decaying mushroom species were paired with three Trichoderma species and Clonostachys rosea in dual-culture experiments on agar based medium. Xylotrophic mushrooms and mycoparasitc fungi in general showed similar competitive ability. Deadlock or mutual inhibition after mycelial contact was observed in 45% of pairings, stable inhibition at a distance occurred in 4.4% of pairings, replacement of xylotrophic fungus by mycoparasitic fungus was observed in 29.4% and the opposite in 20.6% of pairings. Xylotrophi