Efficacy of REACH Forgiveness across Cultures

Across cultures, most people agree that forgiveness is a virtue. However, culture may influence how willing one should be to forgive and how one might express forgiveness. At a university in the United States, we recruited both foreign-extraction students and domestic students (N = 102) to participate in a six-hour REACH Forgiveness intervention. We investigated the efficacy of the intervention overall as well as whether foreign-extraction and domestic students responded differently to treatment. Forgiveness was assessed using two measures—decisional forgiveness and emotional forgiveness. The six-hour REACH Forgiveness intervention improved participants’ ratings of emotional forgiveness, but not decisional forgiveness, regardless of their culture. Thus, the REACH Forgiveness intervention appears equally efficacious for participants from different cultural backgrounds when conducted in the United States with college students

The causality direction of the corporate social responsibility –corporate financial performance nexus: application of Panel Vector Autoregression approach

This study is an attempt to model the bidirectional linkages between corporate social responsibility (CSR) and corporate financial performance (CFP) by using the prospective and retrospective approaches. A panel data set for 100 of the Fortune Most Admired Companies was used to study the relationships. Moreover, 1000 firm-year observations were examined between the sample periods of 2007 and 2016. A new methodology known as Panel Vector Autoregression (Panel VAR) approach using the Generalised Method of Moments (GMM) was used in this study. The salient findings are: (1) better financial performance of firms lead to a better CSR engagement and (2) better CSR need not necessarily lead to superior CFP. A strong and substantial negative impact has been observed on CSR and the three CFP measures, namely, return on equity, return on assets, and return on invested capital. This finding has consistency with the trade-off hypothesis. This hypothesis posits that when firms are ‘‘being socially responsible’’, they will have a tendency to experience minimised shareholder wealth and lower profits, which restricts the socially responsible investments

Rapid Damage Mapping for the 2015 M_w 7.8 Gorkha Earthquake Using Synthetic Aperture Radar Data from COSMO–SkyMed and ALOS-2 Satellites

The 25 April 2015 M_w 7.8 Gorkha earthquake caused more than 8000 fatalities and widespread building damage in central Nepal. The Italian Space Agency’s COSMO–SkyMed Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) satellite acquired data over Kathmandu area four days after the earthquake and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s Advanced Land Observing Satellite-2 SAR satellite for larger area nine days after the mainshock. We used these radar observations and rapidly produced damage proxy maps (DPMs) derived from temporal changes in Interferometric SAR coherence. Our DPMs were qualitatively validated through comparison with independent damage analyses by the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency and the United Nations Institute for Training and Research’s United Nations Operational Satellite Applications Programme, and based on our own visual inspection of DigitalGlobe’s WorldView optical pre- versus postevent imagery. Our maps were quickly released to responding agencies and the public, and used for damage assessment, determining inspection/imaging priorities, and reconnaissance fieldwork

Just add sugar for carbohydrate induced self-assembly of curcumin

In nature, self-assembly processes based on amphiphilic molecules play an integral part in the design of structures of higher order such as cells. Among them, amphiphilic glycoproteins or glycolipids take on a pivotal role due to their bioactivity. Here we show that sugars, in particular, fructose, are capable of directing the self-assembly of highly insoluble curcumin resulting in the formation of well-defined capsules based on non-covalent forces. Simply by mixing an aqueous solution of fructose and curcumin in an open vessel leads to the generation of capsules with sizes ranging between 100 and 150 nm independent of the initial concentrations used. Our results demonstrate that hydrogen bonding displayed by fructose can induce the self-assembly of hydrophobic molecules such as curcumin into well-ordered structures, and serving as a simple and virtually instantaneous way of making nanoparticles from curcumin in water with the potential for template polymerization and nanocarriers.S.W. is grateful for UNSW PhD scholarship. J.H. acknowledges support from the Australian Research Council (DE160100807) and supercomputer resources from the NCI, Pawsey Supercomputing Centre and Intersect Australian Ltd. Finally, M.H.S. and C.J.G. would like to thank the Australian Research Council (ARC DP 160101172) for fundin

Systems and Methods for Advanced Rapid Imaging and Analysis for Earthquakes

Many embodiments provide a hybrid data processing system (HySDS) of an end-to-end geodetic imaging data system enabling near-real-time science, assessment, response, and rapid recovery. The HySDS may be an operation data processing system that integrates data from many different geodetic data sources and/or sensors, including interferometric synthetic aperture radar (InSAR), GPS, pixel tracking, seismology, and/or modeling, and processes the data to generate actionable high quality science data products. The HySDS may provide for an automated imaging and analysis capabilities that is able to handle the imminent increases in raw data from new and existing geodetic monitoring sensor systems

Pre-screening the intrinsic angiogenic capacity of biomaterials in an optimised ex ovo chorioallantoic membrane model

Biomaterial development for clinical applications is currently on the rise. This necessitates adequate in vitro testing, where the structure and composition of biomaterials must be specifically tailored to withstand in situ repair and regeneration responses for a successful clinical outcome. The chorioallantoic membrane of chicken embryos has been previously used to study angiogenesis, a prerequisite for most tissue repair and regeneration. In this study, we report an optimised ex ovo method using a glass-cling film set-up that yields increased embryo survival rates and has an improved protocol for harvesting biomaterials. Furthermore, we used this method to examine the intrinsic angiogenic capacity of a variety of biomaterials categorised as natural, synthetic, natural/synthetic and natural/natural composites with varying porosities. We detected significant differences in biomaterials’ angiogenesis with natural polymers and polymers with a high overall porosity showing a greater vascularisation compared to synthetic polymers. Therefore, our proposed ex ovo chorioallantoic membrane method can be effectively used to pre-screen biomaterials intended for clinical application

The Nature of Composite LINER/HII Galaxies, As Revealed from High-Resolution VLA Observations

A sample of 37 nearby galaxies displaying composite LINER/HII and pure HII spectra was observed with the VLA in an investigation of the nature of their weak radio emission. The resulting radio contour maps overlaid on optical galaxy images are presented here, together with an extensive literature list and discussion of the individual galaxies. Radio morphological data permit assessment of the ``classical AGN'' contribution to the global activity observed in these ``transition'' LINER galaxies. One in five of the latter objects display clear AGN characteristics: these occur exclusively in bulge-dominated hosts.Comment: 31 pages, 27 figures, accepted by ApJ

A model for the cosmological evolution of low frequency radio sources

We present a new evolutionary model that describes the population properties of radio sources at frequencies <5 GHz, thus complementing the De Zotti et al. (2005) model, holding at higher frequencies. We find that simple analytic luminosity evolution is still sufficient to fit the wealth of available data on local luminosity functions, multi-frequency source counts, and redshift distributions. However, the fit requires a luminosity-dependent decline of source luminosities at high redshifts, at least for steep-spectrum sources, thus confirming earlier indications of a "downsizing" also for radio sources. The upturn of source counts at sub-mJy levels is accounted for by a straightforward extrapolation, using the empirical far-IR/radio correlation, of evolutionary models matching the far-IR counts and redshift distributions of star-forming galaxies. We also discuss the implications of the new model for the interpretation of data on large-scale clustering of radio sources and on the Integrated Sachs-Wolfe (ISW) effect, and for the investigation of the contribution of discrete sources to the extragalactic background. As for the ISW effect, a new analysis exploiting a very clean CMB map, yields at a substantially higher significance than reported before.Comment: 14 pages, 11 figures, accepted for publication on MNRA

Humble Doctors, Healthy Patients? Exploring the Relationships Between Clinician Humility and Patient Satisfaction, Trust, and Health Status

Objective: In medicine, numerous commentaries implore clinicians (e.g., physicians, physician assistants, nurse practitioners) to display more humility. However, given the complex power dynamics between patients and clinicians, one should not presume that patients desire and appreciate humble clinicians. This paper examines the relationship between clinician humility and patient outcomes, and aims to provide empirical evidence for the significance of clinician humility. Methods: In two studies, patients (N = 497) recalled their most recent visit to a clinician through an online survey platform (Qualtrics). Patients rated their clinician’s humility, their satisfaction and trust with their clinician, and their health status. They also provided demographic information (e.g., gender, race, subjective SES), details about their clinician (e.g., gender, race, professional status) and information about their last medical visit with this clinician (e.g., purpose of visit, wait time during visit). Results: Through hierarchical multiple regression, we demonstrated that clinician humility positively predicted patient satisfaction, trust, and self-report health (only in Study 2) above and beyond patient, clinician, and visit characteristics. Conclusion: The results demonstrated that clinician humility can predict important patient outcomes above and beyond objective characteristics of the medical interaction. Practice Implications: These findings may shape clinician-patient interactions by validating the pursuit of humility during medical encounters

PTF10iya: A short-lived, luminous flare from the nuclear region of a star-forming galaxy

We present the discovery and characterisation of PTF10iya, a short-lived (dt ~ 10 d, with an optical decay rate of ~ 0.3 mag per d), luminous (M_g ~ -21 mag) transient source found by the Palomar Transient Factory. The ultraviolet/optical spectral energy distribution is reasonably well fit by a blackbody with T ~ 1-2 x 10^4 K and peak bolometric luminosity L_BB ~ 1-5 x 10^44 erg per s (depending on the details of the extinction correction). A comparable amount of energy is radiated in the X-ray band that appears to result from a distinct physical process. The location of PTF10iya is consistent with the nucleus of a star-forming galaxy (z = 0.22405 +/- 0.00006) to within 350 mas (99.7 per cent confidence radius), or a projected distance of less than 1.2 kpc. At first glance, these properties appear reminiscent of the characteristic "big blue bump" seen in the near-ultraviolet spectra of many active galactic nuclei (AGNs). However, emission-line diagnostics of the host galaxy, along with a historical light curve extending back to 2007, show no evidence for AGN-like activity. We therefore consider whether the tidal disruption of a star by an otherwise quiescent supermassive black hole may account for our observations. Though with limited temporal information, PTF10iya appears broadly consistent with the predictions for the early "super-Eddington" phase of a solar-type star disrupted by a ~ 10^7 M_sun black hole. Regardless of the precise physical origin of the accreting material, the large luminosity and short duration suggest that otherwise quiescent galaxies can transition extremely rapidly to radiate near the Eddington limit; many such outbursts may have been missed by previous surveys lacking sufficient cadence.Comment: 18 pages, 8 figures; revised following referee's comment