74 research outputs found
Women In the Cut
Through a comparison between Daphne du Maurier's 1938 novel Rebecca and Susanna Moore's 1995 novel In the Cut, this article considers the extent to which Franco Moretti's theory of the inevitable dissolution of literary genres is true, with specific regard to the genre of the gothic romance. In evaluating both novels' treatment of female subjectivity, unregimented masculinity and the symbiotic relationship between sexual pleasure and mortal danger, this article investigates the degree to which a contemporary novel such as In the Cut, which is generally acknowledged to be an ‘erotic thriller’, is heavily indebted to the gothic romance and may therefore be interpreted as a continuation of this more traditional genre, and, conversely, the means through which Moore's novel exhibits an overt and defiant resistance to the gothic romance, thereby signifying the dissolution of this particular genre within twentieth-century women's writing
Repeated exposure to socioeconomic disadvantage and health selection as life course pathways to mid-life depressive and anxiety disorders
The biomedical examination was funded by
Medical Research Council [G0000934], awarded under the Health of
the Public initiative. Charlotte Clark is supported by an Engineering
and Physical Sciences Research Fellowship. Bryan Rodgers is supported
by Research Fellowships Nos 148948 and 366758 and by
Program Grant No. 179805 from the National Health and Medical
Research Council of Australia. Research at the Institute of Child
Health and Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Trust
benefits from R&D funding received from the NHS Executive
Combining functional weed ecology and crop stable isotope ratios to identify cultivation intensity: a comparison of cereal production regimes in Haute Provence, France and Asturias, Spain
This investigation combines two independent
methods of identifying crop growing conditions and husbandry
practices—functional weed ecology and crop stable
carbon and nitrogen isotope analysis—in order to assess
their potential for inferring the intensity of past cereal
production systems using archaeobotanical assemblages.
Present-day organic cereal farming in Haute Provence,
France features crop varieties adapted to low-nutrient soils
managed through crop rotation, with little to no manuring.
Weed quadrat survey of 60 crop field transects in this region
revealed that floristic variation primarily reflects
geographical differences. Functional ecological weed data
clearly distinguish the Provence fields from those surveyed
in a previous study of intensively managed spelt wheat in
Asturias, north-western Spain: as expected, weed ecological
data reflect higher soil fertility and disturbance in
Asturias. Similarly, crop stable nitrogen isotope values
distinguish between intensive manuring in Asturias and
long-term cultivation with minimal manuring in Haute
Provence. The new model of cereal cultivation intensity
based on weed ecology and crop isotope values in Haute
Provence and Asturias was tested through application to
two other present-day regimes, successfully identifying a
high-intensity regime in the Sighisoara region, Romania,
and low-intensity production in Kastamonu, Turkey. Application
of this new model to Neolithic archaeobotanical
assemblages in central Europe suggests that early farming
tended to be intensive, and likely incorporated manuring,
but also exhibited considerable variation, providing a finer
grained understanding of cultivation intensity than previously
available
Pharmacokinetic-Pharmacodynamic Modeling in Pediatric Drug Development, and the Importance of Standardized Scaling of Clearance.
Pharmacokinetic/pharmacodynamic (PKPD) modeling is important in the design and conduct of clinical pharmacology research in children. During drug development, PKPD modeling and simulation should underpin rational trial design and facilitate extrapolation to investigate efficacy and safety. The application of PKPD modeling to optimize dosing recommendations and therapeutic drug monitoring is also increasing, and PKPD model-based dose individualization will become a core feature of personalized medicine. Following extensive progress on pediatric PK modeling, a greater emphasis now needs to be placed on PD modeling to understand age-related changes in drug effects. This paper discusses the principles of PKPD modeling in the context of pediatric drug development, summarizing how important PK parameters, such as clearance (CL), are scaled with size and age, and highlights a standardized method for CL scaling in children. One standard scaling method would facilitate comparison of PK parameters across multiple studies, thus increasing the utility of existing PK models and facilitating optimal design of new studies
The James Webb Space Telescope Mission
Twenty-six years ago a small committee report, building on earlier studies,
expounded a compelling and poetic vision for the future of astronomy, calling
for an infrared-optimized space telescope with an aperture of at least .
With the support of their governments in the US, Europe, and Canada, 20,000
people realized that vision as the James Webb Space Telescope. A
generation of astronomers will celebrate their accomplishments for the life of
the mission, potentially as long as 20 years, and beyond. This report and the
scientific discoveries that follow are extended thank-you notes to the 20,000
team members. The telescope is working perfectly, with much better image
quality than expected. In this and accompanying papers, we give a brief
history, describe the observatory, outline its objectives and current observing
program, and discuss the inventions and people who made it possible. We cite
detailed reports on the design and the measured performance on orbit.Comment: Accepted by PASP for the special issue on The James Webb Space
Telescope Overview, 29 pages, 4 figure
Effect of Cyclosporin A, Topiramate, or 100% Oxygen as Proposed “Neuroprotective” Therapies on the Microdialysis Parameters of Patients with Severe Traumatic Brain Injury
Recommended from our members
Severe human traumatic brain injury, but not cyclosporin A treatment, depresses activated T lymphocytes early after injury
Recommended from our members
Outcome measures for clinical trials in neurotrauma
Under the auspices of the American Brain Injury Consortium and the Joint Section of Neurotrauma and Critical Care of the American Association of Neurological Surgeons, the authors have reviewed and formulated opinions based on the evidence on protocol design and the outcome measures used for clinical trials in patients with a severe or moderate traumatic brain injury (TBI). First, in view of the heterogeneity of the population under study, the authors suggest that block randomization and stratification should always be used in the design of neurotrauma trials. Second, although the Glasgow Outcome Scale (GOS) remains the most widely used and accepted instrument for TBI trials, the authors believe the eight-point expanded scale that has recently been designed will ultimately provide greater discrimination, and narrower categories and will ultimately prove superior for detecting more subtle changes in outcome. Furthermore, the authors recommend, in view of the profound cognitive impairment in survivors of TBI, that neuropsychological tests be explored further as an adjunct to the GOS. Future research should focus on the development of more sensitive and specific surrogate outcome measures such as magnetic resonance imaging, neurochemical, neuropsychological, and quality of life measures in order to detect a neuroprotective effect in patients with TBI
Safety and Tolerability of Cyclosporin A in Severe Traumatic Brain Injury Patients: Results from a Prospective Randomized Trial
Cyclosporin A (CsA) has recently been proposed for use in the early phase after traumatic brain injury (TBI), for its ability to preserve mitochondrial integrity in experimental brain injury models, and thereby provide improved behavioral outcomes as well as significant histological protection. The aim of this prospective, randomized, double-blind, dual-center, placebo-controlled trial was to evaluate the safety, tolerability, and pharmacokinetics of a single intravenous infusion of CsA in patients with severe TBI. Fifty adult severe TBI patients were enrolled over a 22-month period. Within 12 h of the injury patients received 5 mg/kg of CsA infused over 24 h, or placebo. Blood urea nitrogen (BUN), creatinine, hemoglobin, platelets, white blood cell count (WBC), and a hepatic panel were monitored on admission, and at 12, 24, 36, and 48 h, and on days 4 and 7. Potential adverse events (AEs) were also recorded. Neurological outcome was recorded at 3 and 6 months after injury. This study revealed only transient differences in BUN levels at 24 and 48 h and for WBC counts at 24 h between the CsA and placebo patients. These modest differences were not clinically significant in that they did not negatively impact on patient course. Both BUN and creatinine values, markers of renal function, remained within their normal limits over the entire monitoring period. There were no significant differences in other mean laboratory values, or in the incidence of AEs at any other measured time point. Also, no significant difference was demonstrated for neurological outcome. Based on these results, we report a good safety profile of CsA infusion when given at the chosen dose of 5 mg/kg, infused over 24 h, during the early phase after severe head injury in humans, with the aim of neuroprotection
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