Drinking Water Problems: Nitrates

8 pp., 7 figuresHigh levels of nitrates in drinking water can be harmful for very young infants and susceptible adults. This publication explains how people are exposed to nitrates, what health effects are caused by them in drinking water and how to remove them

Drinking Water Problems: Arsenic

8 pp., 5 figuresHigh levels of arsenic in drinking water can poison and even kill people. This publication explains the symptoms of arsenic poisoning and common treatment methods for removing arsenic from your water supply

AXTAR: Mission Design Concept

The Advanced X-ray Timing Array (AXTAR) is a mission concept for X-ray timing of compact objects that combines very large collecting area, broadband spectral coverage, high time resolution, highly flexible scheduling, and an ability to respond promptly to time-critical targets of opportunity. It is optimized for submillisecond timing of bright Galactic X-ray sources in order to study phenomena at the natural time scales of neutron star surfaces and black hole event horizons, thus probing the physics of ultradense matter, strongly curved spacetimes, and intense magnetic fields. AXTAR's main instrument, the Large Area Timing Array (LATA) is a collimated instrument with 2-50 keV coverage and over 3 square meters effective area. The LATA is made up of an array of supermodules that house 2-mm thick silicon pixel detectors. AXTAR will provide a significant improvement in effective area (a factor of 7 at 4 keV and a factor of 36 at 30 keV) over the RXTE PCA. AXTAR will also carry a sensitive Sky Monitor (SM) that acts as a trigger for pointed observations of X-ray transients in addition to providing high duty cycle monitoring of the X-ray sky. We review the science goals and technical concept for AXTAR and present results from a preliminary mission design study.Comment: 19 pages, 10 figures, to be published in Space Telescopes and Instrumentation 2010: Ultraviolet to Gamma Ray, Proceedings of SPIE Volume 773

Home-body/Kitchen Table Solo Show (2020 – 23) exhibited in 'Rupture, Rapture: Womxn in Collage'

Home-body/Kitchen Table Solo Show, is a composite installation of a series of works made during the pandemic - from within sixty weeks of shielding: In this context, one type of interior is the shell - a networked container maintained by labour and producing waste, reaching for community and receiving shopping. Another interior is the body within, navigating complex dependencies and desires. These works were all made on the edges of a kitchen table and draw on Mendelson's, often positive, experiences of the home-as-skin. A new, painted platform was produced for this exhibition, allowing the 'kitchen table' itself to fold into the work. ‘Rupture, Rapture: Womxn in Collage’ is a publication, residency and survey exhibition. 25 August - 23 September 2023 Patricia Fleming Gallery, Glasgow 'Rupture, Rapture: Womxn in Collage' brings together new and existing works, alongside special commissions to showcase collage in an expanded field, incorporating multimedia, sculpture, sound and performance art. Displaying over twenty collage works by 14 womxn artists, this exhibition challenges the notion of collage as a fixed category or form—instead revealing collage as a feminist praxis of transformation, rupture, and collision. Commissioned works will be presented by 16NSt resident artists’ Edie Baker, Gabrielle Lockwood Estrin, and Hannan Jones, developed in-situ at Patricia Fleming Gallery, along with a collage installation and performance from Jen DeNike (16th Sep), exhibiting the artist’s work in Scotland for the first time. New and historic work will be shown by Sam Ainsley, Claire Barclay, Barbara F. Kendrick, Janie Nicoll, Kate V. Robertson, and Catherine Street. Significant existing works will be displayed by Louise Hopkins, Zoë Mendelson, Victoria Morton, and Alberta Whittle. Curated by Aga Paulina Młyńczak and Nell Cardozo with support from Kelly Rappleye (16NSt Curatorial Collective), Sam Ainsley (artist and former Head of Glasgow School of Art’s MFA) and artist Janie Nicoll, this survey exhibition hosted by Patricia Fleming Gallery displays a diverse repertoire of over twenty collage works, several of which have never been shown before. By putting multimedia sculptural installations together with paper works, Młyńczak and Cardozo aim to expand the notion of what contemporary collage can do. Displaying work from womxn artists at various stages in their careers who use expanded collage processes, this exhibition aims to create an inter-generational feminist dialogue. 16NSt’s Rupture, Rapture: Womxn in Collage project comprises an emerging artists’ residency and publication alongside this exhibition to trace an alternative, feminist lineage of collage in everyday practices by womxn and queer communities, which have traditionally been refused art historical recognition, from scrapbooking to collage poetry. These homegrown acts of cultural transformation inform the ethos of cross-media experimentation and re-assemblage of everyday material that is shared across the works in this exhibition. PUBLICATION Accompanying the exhibition will launch a limited-release publication ‘RUPTURE, RAPTURE’, featuring rarely-seen collage works by Maud Sulter alongside a critical survey of contemporary womxn’s collage in Scotlan

Genetic mechanisms of critical illness in COVID-19.

Host-mediated lung inflammation is present1, and drives mortality2, in the critical illness caused by coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Host genetic variants associated with critical illness may identify mechanistic targets for therapeutic development3. Here we report the results of the GenOMICC (Genetics Of Mortality In Critical Care) genome-wide association study in 2,244 critically ill patients with COVID-19 from 208 UK intensive care units. We have identified and replicated the following new genome-wide significant associations: on chromosome 12q24.13 (rs10735079, P = 1.65 × 10-8) in a gene cluster that encodes antiviral restriction enzyme activators (OAS1, OAS2 and OAS3); on chromosome 19p13.2 (rs74956615, P = 2.3 × 10-8) near the gene that encodes tyrosine kinase 2 (TYK2); on chromosome 19p13.3 (rs2109069, P = 3.98 ×  10-12) within the gene that encodes dipeptidyl peptidase 9 (DPP9); and on chromosome 21q22.1 (rs2236757, P = 4.99 × 10-8) in the interferon receptor gene IFNAR2. We identified potential targets for repurposing of licensed medications: using Mendelian randomization, we found evidence that low expression of IFNAR2, or high expression of TYK2, are associated with life-threatening disease; and transcriptome-wide association in lung tissue revealed that high expression of the monocyte-macrophage chemotactic receptor CCR2 is associated with severe COVID-19. Our results identify robust genetic signals relating to key host antiviral defence mechanisms and mediators of inflammatory organ damage in COVID-19. Both mechanisms may be amenable to targeted treatment with existing drugs. However, large-scale randomized clinical trials will be essential before any change to clinical practice

Sedimentation and pedogenesis of the Lower Cretaceous Hensel Formation, central Texas

The Lower Cretaceous Hensel Formation in central Texas consists of predominantly terrigenous sediments deposited during the marine transgression of the Glen Rose and Fredericksburg Group carbonates. Hensel outcrops south of the Llano Uplift are composed of coarse-grained, lenticular, framework deposits and finer grained, extensive, matrix deposits. Framework facies include cross-stratified conglomerate, conglomeratic sandstone, and sandstone. These facies represent small fluvial systems whose channel-fill textures and morphologies changed in response to lowered channel gradients and decreased sediment supply. Matrix facies include calcretized (calichified) red mudstone and thin, sheet sandstone, interpreted as paleosols and overbank deposits. The pervasive development of calcrete, desiccation cracks, and pseudo-anticlines within the Hensel paleosols, as well as the overall depositional style of the unit imply an arid to semi-arid, seasonal climate. Paleopedogenesis resulted in the formation of authigenic kaolin and illite, intense red-orange coloration, and various types of calcrete. Paleocalcrete is most abundant within the mudstone facies where it assumes a nodular habit, commonly found as rhizoconcretions or coalesced into honeycomb structures. Calcretized, thin-bedded sandstone and mudstone buckled into pseudo-anticlines in one locality. Microscopic soil features in all matrix calcretes include orthic and disorthic glaebules of low-Mg calcite, crystallaria, pedodes, circumgranular cracks, and joint planes. Calcian-ferroan dolomite with limpid overgrowths and fibrous calcite are confined to the "tepee" calcrete. Paleocalcrete accumulated in the framework sandstone facies as undulating hardpans and vertically oriented rhizoliths. Microscopic textures in these calcretes are similar to those in the nodules and calcretized sandstones of the matrix facies. Detrital grains are widely dispersed and silica is but slightly replaced by calcium carbonate. This evidence suggests that displacive crystallization of calcitic glaebules and fibers was the most significant precipitation mechanism during calcretization in both the mudstone and sandstone facies. Carbon and oxygen isotopic values from each representative calcrete confirm a pedogenic origin for the authigenic calcite. "Heavier" isotopic values for the pseudo-anticline dolomite denote an enrichment of meteoric groundwaters by extreme evaporation. These conditions would have existed near a continental playa, an environmental interpretation considered appropriate for such a setting.Geological Science

Report (Texas Water Development Board)

"The purpose of this report is to describe the water quality of the Blaine Aquifer, particularly as compared with public drinking water standards, and to analyze, if possible, any changes in water quality over time.