Multilevel correlates of household anthropometric typologies in Colombian mothers and their infants

Background. The aim of this study was to establish the association of maternal, family, and contextual correlates of anthropometric typologies at the household level in Colombia using 2005 Demographic Health Survey (DHS/ENDS) data.Methods. Household-level information from mothers 18-49 years old and their children less than 5 years old was included. Stunting and overweight were assessed for each child. Mothers were classified according to their body mass index. Four anthropometric typologies at the household level were constructed: normal, underweight, overweight, and dual burden. Four three-level [households (n = 8598) nested within municipalities (n = 226), nested within states (n = 32)] hierarchical polytomous logistic models were developed. Household log-odds of belonging to one of the four anthropometric categories, holding 'normal' as the reference group, were obtained.Results. This study found that anthropometric typologies were associated with maternal and family characteristics of maternal age, parity, maternal education, and wealth index. Higher municipal living conditions index was associated with a lower likelihood of underweight typology and a higher likelihood of overweight typology. Higher population density was associated with a lower likelihood of overweight typology.Conclusion. Distal and proximal determinants of the various anthropometric typologies at the household level should be taken into account when framing policies and designing interventions to reduce malnutrition in Colombia. Copyright © The Author(s) 2018

Electromagnetic Polarizabilities and Charge Radii of the Nucleons in the Diquark-model

The diquark model is used to calculate the electromagnetic polarizabilities and charge radii of the nucleons for three different potentials. Making the scalar diquark lower in mass introduces a mixing angle $\theta$ between the $\left| 56\right\rangle$ and $\left| 70\right\rangle$ states ,which allows an improvement in value of all 6 properties. Generalizing the Gamov-Teller matrix and the magnetic moment operator to the diquark model gives constraints on this mixing. We obtain for the Richardson potential $\theta =23.2^{\circ },$ $\overline{\alpha }_p=7.9_{-0.9}^{+1.0}\times 10^{-4}fm^3,$ $\overline{\alpha }_n=7.7_{-0.6}^{+0.3}\times 10^{-4}fm^3,$ $\overline{\beta }_p=5.4_{-0.4}^{+1.6}\times 10^{-4}fm^3,$ $\overline{\beta }_n=6.7_{-0.7}^{+1.3}\times 10^{-4}fm^3,$ $\left\langle r^2\right\rangle _p=0.37_{-0.03}^{+0.02}fm^2,$ $\left\langle r^2\right\rangle _n=-0.07_{-0.02}^{+0.03}fm^2.$ Additional pion cloud contributions could improve on all six results.Comment: 15 Pages, Latex, Figs on request, to be published Phys.Lett.B. Minor errors corrected and eqn 5,6,8,9 correcte

Bone Ingrowth into Porous Coated Canine Total Hip Replacements. Quantification by Backscattered Scanning Electron Microscopy and Image Analysis

Bone ingrowth into titanium fiber mesh porous-surfaced canine total hip replacement prostheses was evaluated and quantified using a computer assisted image analysis system attached to a scanning electron microscope equipped with a back scattered electron detector. Excellent contrast between the bone, the porous metal and the soft tissues resulted in the backscatter mode, allowing easy differentiation of these components in real time by the image analysis based on gray scales. By three weeks the mean (± standard deviation) amount of bone ingrowth expressed as a percentage of porous layer measured 7.2% (± 1.5%) for the acetabular components, and 3.9% (± 1.7%) for the femoral components. At six weeks the amount of bone ingrowth increased to 10.5% (± 1.3%) for the acetabular components and 8.5% (± 1.4%) for the femoral components. Cementless prosthetic fixation using porous surfaced prostheses holds great promise in joint replacement surgery, and the ability to quantitate the amount of bone ingrowth will permit the evaluation of the efficacy of various techniques to improve bone ingrowth

Sophisticated collective foraging with minimalist agents: a swarm robotics test

How groups of cooperative foragers can achieve efficient and robust collective foraging is of interest both to biologists studying social insects and engineers designing swarm robotics systems. Of particular interest are distance-quality trade-offs and swarm-size-dependent foraging strategies. Here we present a collective foraging system based on virtual pheromones, tested in simulation and in swarms of up to 200 physical robots. Our individual agent controllers are highly simplified, as they are based on binary pheromone sensors. Despite being simple, our individual controllers are able to reproduce classical foraging experiments conducted with more capable real ants that sense pheromone concentration and follow its gradient. One key feature of our controllers is a control parameter which balances the trade-off between distance selectivity and quality selectivity of individual foragers. We construct an optimal foraging theory model that accounts for distance and quality of resources, as well as overcrowding, and predicts a swarmsize-dependent strategy. We test swarms implementing our controllers against our optimality model and find that, for moderate swarm sizes, they can be parameterised to approximate the optimal foraging strategy. This study demonstrates the sufficiency of simple individual agent rules to generate sophisticated collective foraging behaviour

A Reappraisal of Diversification in the Federal Courts: Gender Effects in the Courts of Appeals

Prior scholarship on the effect of the increasing number of female judges leads to three contrasting sets of expectations. Early writings and views of affirmative-action activists suggested that female judges would be more liberal than male judges. On the other hand, a series of empirical studies suggest that we should expect no gender differences. In contrast to both of these perspectives, several feminist scholars suggest that women will be more liberal only when that position expresses support for full participation in the community. These contrasting expectations were tested by analyzing the votes of appeals court decisions in three issue areas. No differences were discovered between male and female judges in obscenity or criminal search and seizure cases. However, in employment discrimination cases, female judges were significantly more liberal than their male colleagues

Multilevel correlates of household anthropometric typologies in Colombian mothers and their infants

Background. The aim of this study was to establish the association of maternal, family, and contextual correlates of anthropometric typologies at the household level in Colombia using 2005 Demographic Health Survey (DHS/ENDS) data.Methods. Household-level information from mothers 18-49 years old and their children less than 5 years old was included. Stunting and overweight were assessed for each child. Mothers were classified according to their body mass index. Four anthropometric typologies at the household level were constructed: normal, underweight, overweight, and dual burden. Four three-level [households (n = 8598) nested within municipalities (n = 226), nested within states (n = 32)] hierarchical polytomous logistic models were developed. Household log-odds of belonging to one of the four anthropometric categories, holding 'normal' as the reference group, were obtained.Results. This study found that anthropometric typologies were associated with maternal and family characteristics of maternal age, parity, maternal education, and wealth index. Higher municipal living conditions index was associated with a lower likelihood of underweight typology and a higher likelihood of overweight typology. Higher population density was associated with a lower likelihood of overweight typology.Conclusion. Distal and proximal determinants of the various anthropometric typologies at the household level should be taken into account when framing policies and designing interventions to reduce malnutrition in Colombia. Copyright © The Author(s) 2018

Influence of radiation damage and isochronal annealing on the magnetic susceptibility of Pu(1-x)Am(x) alloys

Results of radiation damage in Pu and Pu{sub 1-x}Am{sub x} alloys studied with magnetic susceptibility, {chi}(T), and resistivity are presented. Damage accumulated at low temperatures increases {chi}(T) for all measured alloys, with the trend generally enhanced as the lattice expands. There is a trend towards saturation observable in the damage induced magnetic susceptibility data, that is not evident in similar damage induced resistivity data taken on the same specimen. A comparison of isochronal annealing curves measured by both resistivity and magnetic susceptibility on a 4.3at% Ga stabilized {delta}-Pu specimen show that Stage I annealing, where interstitials begin to move, is largely transparent to the magnetic measurement. This indicates that interstitials have little impact on the damage induced increase in the magnetic susceptibility. The isochronal annealing curves of the Pu{sub 1-x}Am{sub x} alloys do not show distinct annealing stages as expected for alloys. However, samples near 20% Am concentration show an unexpected increase in magnetization beginning when specimens are annealed to 35K. This behavior is also reflected in a time dependent increase in the magnetic susceptibility of damaged specimens indicative of first order kinetics. These results suggest there may be a metastable phase induced by radiation damage and annealing in Pu{sub 1-x}Am{sub x} alloys

Spectroscopic investigations of neptunium`s and plutonium`s oxidation states in sol-gel glasses as a function of initial valance and thermal history

Several oxidation states of neptunium and plutonium, Pu(III),Pu (IV), PU(VI), Np(IV), Np(V) and Np (VI), were studied in glasses prepared by a sol-gel technology. The oxidation state of these actinides was determined primarily by absorption spectrometry and followed as a function of the solidification process, subsequent aging and thermal treatments. It was determined that the initial oxidation state of the actinides in the starting solutions was essentially maintained through the solidification process to form the glasses. However, during densification and removal of residual solvents at elevated temperatures, both actinides in the different sol-gel products converted completely to their tetravalent states. These results are discussed in terms of our findings in comparable studies that only the tetravalent states of plutonium and neptunium are formed in glasses prepared by dissolving their dioxides in different molten- glass formulations

Gliadin antibody detection in gluten enteropathy

Circulating antigliadin antibody has been described in patients with gluten enteropathy although the prevalence varies in different studies. It has been suggested that the investigation for antigliadin antibody might be useful as a screening test. The object of the present study was to evaluate two different techniques for assaying these antibodies — an indirect immunofluorescent method and an enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA). Antibodies were assayed in the sera of 102 patients in whom jejunal biopsies were also obtained. The specificity of both tests was greater than 95%, and the correlation between the presence of antibody and histology was significant (p < 0.005), though the sensitivity of each test was less than 70%