Snapping Turtle Life History on Lacreek Refuge, South Dakota

Investigations of the snapping turtle population on Lacreek National Wildlife Refuge in south-central South Dakota were conducted during 1965-67. Turtles captured by trapping, “hooking”, boxing nests and catching nesting females were measured, marked and released. Turtles were marked by toe-clipping, routing, flagging, and tagging. Attaching a metal tag with a “pop-rivet gun” was the most successful marking technique. Molluscs (95 percent frequency) and vegetation (91 percent frequency) were the most important food items of 22 turtles captured on Valentine Refuge in north-central Nebraska. Bird remains were found in 23 percent of the stomachs. Recapture of marked turtles indicated that individual movement was not extensive and occurred primarily within a single water management unit. Mean distance moved per year was 0.57 miles and mean distance per day within the same year was 0.07 miles. Procedures for obtaining an index of turtle population size and annual changes based on counting nesting females by driving selected refuge dikes were considered reliable. Capture – recapture methods yielded a population estimate of 2415 adult turtles on Lacreek Refuge in 1967. Fifty-nine percent of turtle nests were destroyed by predators and hatchling emergence success was less than 20 percent in undisturbed nests. Predation upon hatchlings greatly reduced each year class the first three years of life. Reproduction within the refuge contributed little to maintenance or growth of the population during this study. Immigration of adults from downstream and immature from upstream was considered an important factor in population growth. Studies of annuli in bony structures indicated that these may be useful as an aging technique. Measurements of recapture adults and captive turtles, as well as evaluations of shield and long bone annuli suggested growth follows a sigmoid curve

Development and validation of the Treatment Related Impact Measure of Weight (TRIM-Weight)

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The use of prescription anti-obesity medication (AOM) is becoming increasingly common as treatment options grow and become more accessible. However, AOM may not be without a wide range of potentially negative impacts on patient functioning and well being. The Treatment Related Impact Measure (TRIM-Weight) is an obesity treatment-specific patient reported outcomes (PRO) measure designed to assess the key impacts of prescription anti-obesity medication. This paper will present the validation findings for the TRIM-Weight.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>The online validation battery survey was administered in four countries (the U.S., U.K., Australia, and Canada). Eligible subjects were over age eighteen, currently taking a prescription AOM and were currently or had been obese during their life. Validation analyses were conducted according to an <it>a priori </it>statistical analysis plan. Item level psychometric and conceptual criteria were used to refine and reduce the preliminary item pool and factor analysis to identify structural domains was performed. Reliability and validity testing was then performed and the minimally importance difference (MID) explored.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Two hundred and eight subjects completed the survey. Twenty-one of the 43 items were dropped and a five-factor structure was achieved: Daily Life, Weight Management, Treatment Burden, Experience of Side Effects, and Psychological Health. <it>A-priori </it>criteria for internal consistency and test-retest coefficients for the total score and all five subscales were met. All pre-specified hypotheses for convergent and known group validity were also met with the exception of the domain of Daily Life (proven in an ad hoc analysis) as well as the 1/2 standard deviation threshold for the MID.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The development and validation of the TRIM-Weight has been conducted according to well-defined principles for the creation of a PRO measure. Based on the evidence to date, the TRIM-Weight can be considered a brief, conceptually sound, valid and reliable PRO measure.</p

Development and characterisation of a novel three-dimensional inter-kingdom wound biofilm model

Chronic diabetic foot ulcers are frequently colonised and infected by polymicrobial biofilms that ultimately prevent healing. This study aimed to create a novel in vitro inter-kingdom wound biofilm model on complex hydrogel-based cellulose substrata to test commonly used topical wound treatments. Inter-kingdom triadic biofilms composed of Candida albicans, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and Staphylococcus aureus were shown to be quantitatively greater in this model compared to a simple substratum when assessed by conventional culture, metabolic dye and live dead qPCR. These biofilms were both structurally complex and compositionally dynamic in response to topical therapy, so when treated with either chlorhexidine or povidone iodine, principal component analysis revealed that the 3-D cellulose model was minimally impacted compared to the simple substratum model. This study highlights the importance of biofilm substratum and inclusion of relevant polymicrobial and inter-kingdom components, as these impact penetration and efficacy of topical antiseptics

Batch kernel SOM and related Laplacian methods for social network analysis

Large graphs are natural mathematical models for describing the structure of the data in a wide variety of fields, such as web mining, social networks, information retrieval, biological networks, etc. For all these applications, automatic tools are required to get a synthetic view of the graph and to reach a good understanding of the underlying problem. In particular, discovering groups of tightly connected vertices and understanding the relations between those groups is very important in practice. This paper shows how a kernel version of the batch Self Organizing Map can be used to achieve these goals via kernels derived from the Laplacian matrix of the graph, especially when it is used in conjunction with more classical methods based on the spectral analysis of the graph. The proposed method is used to explore the structure of a medieval social network modeled through a weighted graph that has been directly built from a large corpus of agrarian contracts

Revascularization of the Periodontium After Tooth Grafting in Monkeys

In replanted and homo transplanted teeth a vascular network developed in the blood clot between the two parts of the torn periodontium, which allowed the grafted ligament to regain its vascularity. When dentoalveolar ankylosis developed, the periodontal vasculature was split into a number of vascular clusters. In homotransplants, a definite cellular immunologic response by the host was absent. An acrylic radicular obturator was used.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/67229/2/10.1177_00220345710500025101.pd

Extent of Thoracic Aortic Atheroma Burden and Long-Term Mortality After Cardiothoracic Surgery A Computed Tomography Study

ObjectivesWe hypothesized that the extent of aortic atheroma of the entire thoracic aorta, determined by pre-operative multidetector-row computed tomographic angiography (MDCTA), is associated with long-term mortality following nonaortic cardiothoracic surgery.BackgroundIn patients evaluated for cardiothoracic surgery, presence of severe aortic atheroma is associated with adverse short- and long-term post-operative outcome. However, the relationship between aortic plaque burden and mortality remains unknown.MethodsWe reviewed clinical and imaging data from all patients who underwent electrocardiographic-gated contrast-enhanced MDCTA prior to coronary bypass or valvular heart surgery at our institution between 2002 and 2008. MDCTA studies were analyzed for thickness and circumferential extent of aortic atheroma in 5 segments of the thoracic aorta. A semiquantitative total plaque-burden score (TPBS) was calculated by assigning a score of 1 to 3 to plaque thickness and to circumferential plaque extent. When combined, this resulted in a score of 0 to 6 for each of the 5 segments and, hence, an overall score from 0 to 30. The primary end point was all-cause mortality during long-term follow-up.ResultsA total of 862 patients (71% men, 67.8 years) were included and followed over a mean period of 25 ± 16 months. The mean TPBS was 8.6 (SD: ±6.0). The TPBS was a statistically significant predictor of mortality (p < 0.0001) while controlling for baseline demographics, cardiovascular risk factors, and type of surgery including reoperative status. The estimated hazard ratio for TPBS was 1.08 (95% confidence interval: 1.045 to 1.12). Other independent predictors of mortality were glomerular filtration rate (p = 0.015), type of surgery (p = 0.007), and peripheral artery disease (p = 0.03).ConclusionsExtent of thoracic aortic atheroma burden is independently associated with increased long-term mortality in patients following cardiothoracic surgery. Although our data do not provide definitive evidence, they suggest a relationship to the systemic atherosclerotic disease process and, therefore, have important implications for secondary prevention in post-operative rehabilitation programs

Rapid ascent of rhyolitic magma at Chaitén volcano, Chile

International audienceAlthough rhyolite magma has fuelled some of the Earth's largest explosive volcanic eruptions, our understanding of these events is incomplete due to the previous lack of direct observation of these eruptions. On 1 May 2008, Chaitén volcano in Chile erupted rhyolite magma unexpectedly and explosively. Here, petrological and experimental data are presented that indicate that the hydrous rhyolite magma at Chaitén ascended very rapidly from storage depth to near-surface, with velocities of the order of one metre per second

Hubble Space Telescope WFC3 Early Release Science: Emission-Line Galaxies from Infrared Grism Observations

We present grism spectra of emission-line galaxies (ELGs) from 0.6-1.6 microns from the Wide Field Camera 3 on the Hubble Space Telescope. These new infrared grism data augment previous optical Advanced Camera for Surveys G800L 0.6-0.95 micron grism data in GOODS-South from the PEARS program, extending the wavelength covereage well past the G800L red cutoff. The ERS grism field was observed at a depth of 2 orbits per grism, yielding spectra of hundreds of faint objects, a subset of which are presented here. ELGs are studied via the Ha, [OIII], and [OII] emission lines detected in the redshift ranges 0.2<z<1.4, 1.2<z<2.2 and 2.0<z<3.3 respectively in the G102 (0.8-1.1 microns; R~210) and G141 (1.1-1.6 microns; R~130) grisms. The higher spectral resolution afforded by the WFC3 grisms also reveals emission lines not detectable with the G800L grism (e.g., [SII] and [SIII] lines). From these relatively shallow observations, line luminosities, star-formation rates, and grism spectroscopic redshifts are determined for a total of 48 ELGs to m(AB)~25 mag. Seventeen GOODS-South galaxies that previously only had photometric redshifts now have new grism-spectroscopic redshifts, in some cases with large corrections to the photometric redshifts (Delta(z)~0.3-0.5). Additionally, one galaxy had no previously-measured redshift but now has a secure grism-spectroscopic redshift, for a total of 18 new GOODS-South spectroscopic redshifts. The faintest source in our sample has a magnitude m(AB)=26.9 mag. The ERS grism data also reflect the expected trend of lower specific star formation rates for the highest mass galaxies in the sample as a function of redshift, consistent with downsizing and discovered previously from large surveys. These results demonstrate the remarkable efficiency and capability of the WFC3 NIR grisms for measuring galaxy properties to faint magnitudes and redshifts to z>2.Comment: Accepted for publication in AJ. Updated to include referee comments. Updated sample using improved reduction contains 23 new galaxies (Table 1; Figures 2 & 3