The celebrity entrepreneur on television: profile, politics and power

This article examines the rise of the ‘celebrity entrepreneur’ on television through the emergence of the ‘business entertainment format’ and considers the ways in which regular television exposure can be converted into political influence. Within television studies there has been a preoccupation in recent years with how lifestyle and reality formats work to transform ‘ordinary’ people into celebrities. As a result, the contribution of vocationally skilled business professionals to factual entertainment programming has gone almost unnoticed. This article draws on interviews with key media industry professionals and begins by looking at the construction of entrepreneurs as different types of television personalities and how discourses of work, skill and knowledge function in business shows. It then outlines how entrepreneurs can utilize their newly acquired televisual skills to cultivate a wider media profile and secure various forms of political access and influence. Integral to this is the centrality of public relations and media management agencies in shaping media discourses and developing the individual as a ‘brand identity’ that can be used to endorse a range of products or ideas. This has led to policy makers and politicians attempting to mobilize the media profile of celebrity entrepreneurs to reach out and connect with the public on business and enterprise-related issues

Risk profiles and one-year outcomes of patients with newly diagnosed atrial fibrillation in India: Insights from the GARFIELD-AF Registry.

BACKGROUND: The Global Anticoagulant Registry in the FIELD-Atrial Fibrillation (GARFIELD-AF) is an ongoing prospective noninterventional registry, which is providing important information on the baseline characteristics, treatment patterns, and 1-year outcomes in patients with newly diagnosed non-valvular atrial fibrillation (NVAF). This report describes data from Indian patients recruited in this registry. METHODS AND RESULTS: A total of 52,014 patients with newly diagnosed AF were enrolled globally; of these, 1388 patients were recruited from 26 sites within India (2012-2016). In India, the mean age was 65.8 years at diagnosis of NVAF. Hypertension was the most prevalent risk factor for AF, present in 68.5% of patients from India and in 76.3% of patients globally (P < 0.001). Diabetes and coronary artery disease (CAD) were prevalent in 36.2% and 28.1% of patients as compared with global prevalence of 22.2% and 21.6%, respectively (P < 0.001 for both). Antiplatelet therapy was the most common antithrombotic treatment in India. With increasing stroke risk, however, patients were more likely to receive oral anticoagulant therapy [mainly vitamin K antagonist (VKA)], but average international normalized ratio (INR) was lower among Indian patients [median INR value 1.6 (interquartile range {IQR}: 1.3-2.3) versus 2.3 (IQR 1.8-2.8) (P < 0.001)]. Compared with other countries, patients from India had markedly higher rates of all-cause mortality [7.68 per 100 person-years (95% confidence interval 6.32-9.35) vs 4.34 (4.16-4.53), P < 0.0001], while rates of stroke/systemic embolism and major bleeding were lower after 1 year of follow-up. CONCLUSION: Compared to previously published registries from India, the GARFIELD-AF registry describes clinical profiles and outcomes in Indian patients with AF of a different etiology. The registry data show that compared to the rest of the world, Indian AF patients are younger in age and have more diabetes and CAD. Patients with a higher stroke risk are more likely to receive anticoagulation therapy with VKA but are underdosed compared with the global average in the GARFIELD-AF. CLINICAL TRIAL REGISTRATION-URL: http://www.clinicaltrials.gov. Unique identifier: NCT01090362

Beneficial and Detrimental Effects of UV on Aquatic Organisms: Implications of Spectral Variation

Solar ultraviolet radiation (UVR) may have beneficial as well as detrimental effects on living systems. For example, UV-B radiation (280¿320 nm) is generally damaging, while UV-A radiation (320¿400 nm) may cause damage or stimulate beneficial photorepair of UV-B damage. The nature of both direct and indirect effects of UVR in nature depends on both the photon flux density and the spectral composition of the radiation incident on aquatic organisms across environmental UVR gradients in space (depth, transparency, elevation) and time (diel, seasonal, interannual). Here we use the common and widespread freshwater cladoceran Daphnia pulicaria as a model organism to demonstrate the potential importance of these wavelength-specific effects of UVR to the ecology of aquatic organisms. UVR-exposure experiments are used to manipulate both natural solar and artificial UVR sources to examine the beneficial as well as detrimental effects of different wavelengths of UVR. Changes in the spectral composition of solar radiation are also examined along several natural environmental gradients including diel gradients, depth gradients, and dissolved organic carbon (DOC) gradients. The implications of variation in the spectral composition of UVR for aquatic organisms are discussed. The first biological weighting function (BWF) for a freshwater cladoceran is presented here. It demonstrates that the shortest UV-B wavelengths in sunlight are potentially the most damaging per photon. However, due to the greater photon flux density of longer wavelength UVR in sunlight, the net potential damage to Daphnia in nature is greatest for the longer wavelength UV-B and shorter wavelength UV-A radiation in the 305¿322 nm range. Overall the contribution of UV-B to the total mortality response of Daphnia exposed to full-spectrum solar radiation for 7 h on a sunny summer day is 64% while UV-A contributes 36%. The BWF for Daphnia is used with the transmission spectrum for Mylar D to demonstrate that Mylar D cuts out only about half of the damaging UVR in sunlight. Following exposure to damaging UV-B, Daphnia exhibits a dramatic increase in survival in the presence of longer wavelength UV-A and visible radiation due to the stimulation of photoenzymatic repair. We present data that demonstrate the importance of both atmospheric ozone and DOC in creating strong environmental gradients in the intensity (irradiance) and spectral composition of solar UVR in nature. The light-absorbing component of DOC, chromophoric dissolved organic matter (CDOM), is particularly important in creating depth refugia from damaging UV-B in freshwater ecosystems. CDOM may also cause intense variations in the ratio of potentially beneficial UV-A to detrimental UV-B radiation to which aquatic organisms are exposed. In addition to changes in atmospheric ozone, future changes in CDOM related to climate change or other environmental disturbances may substantially alter the underwater exposure of a variety of aquatic organisms to different wavelengths of solar UV

Ecological modulation of environmental stress: interactions between UV radiation, epibiotic snail embryos, plants and herbivores

The distribution of egg masses of the freshwater snails Lymnaea stagnalis and Planorbarius corneus on the undersides of water lily leaves (e.g. Nuphar lutea) is related to the prevalence of the leaf-mining beetle Galerucella nymphaeae. When given the choice, Planorbarius significantly avoids leaves that were infested by the mining beetle. Conversely, Lymnaea did not discriminate against mined leaves. Intact Nuphar leaves block over 95% of incident ultraviolet radiation. Yet, ultraviolet transmission reaches almost 100% under beetle mining scars. These are several times wider than snail embryos. When exposed to natural sunlight, Lymnaea embryos proved to be resistant to ambient ultraviolet, while Planorbarius embryos were rapidly killed. Thus, one selective advantage of Planorbarius discrimination against mined leaves when depositing its eggs could be the avoidance of ultraviolet radiation passing through mining scars. Other mining-related modifications of the leaves, reduced area, decreased longevity, altered aufwuchs (i.e. biofilm and epibionts) are discussed but seem less relevant for the oviposition preference of Planorbarius. The discriminatory behaviour of this snail species was triggered by water-borne cues emitted by the damaged leaf, not by the eggs or larvae of the beetle. This study illustrates how environmental stress on a given species, ultraviolet radiation in this case, can be ecologically buffered (shading by Nuphar) or enhanced (reduction of Nuphar shading through beetle mining) by associated species. It highlights how the impact of a given stress depends on the identity of the target species as well as on the identity and role of other species in the community

A survey investigation of the effects of music listening on chronic pain

Research interest into alternatives to analgesic medication has grown substantially during the past two decades. Moreover, a number of studies have provided empirical evidence that music listening, and in particular listening to our own preferred music, may provide an emotionally engaging distraction capable of reducing both the sensation of pain itself and the accompanying negative affective experience. The current study is a survey of 318 chronic pain sufferers, which aimed to (i) give a detailed description of the music listening behaviour of this group and relate this to experience of pain and quality of life, and (ii) indicate the numbers who consider music listening to be part of their pain management and investigate their perceptions of the benefits. Results indicated distraction and relaxation to be the most frequently perceived benefits of music reported by participants. Both frequent music listening and a perception of music as personally important were further found to relate to higher quality of life. Also, personal importance of music was significantly related to listening to help pain. These findings suggest beneficial effects of music listening to long-term pain