Sensitivity of an Ultrasonic Technique for Axial Stress Determination

In machine assembly it is often required that bolts used to fasten machine parts be installed with specific design preloads. Because it is inconvenient to measure preload directly, preload specifications are usually based on some more easily measured quantity with which the level of preload may be correlated. Most often this quantity is the torque to be applied to the bolt at installation. Studies by Blake and Kurtz [1] and Heyman [2] have shown that when bolts are torqued into place, the fraction of applied torque which translates into useful preload is small and widely variable. This is so because the large majority of applied torque is absorbed in overcoming friction in the bolt’s threads and at the underside of the bolt’s head. Consequently, even though the torque to install different bolts may be identical, small variations in frictional conditions from one installation to the next can result in large variations in preload. The unreliability of torque as an indicator of preload has been the motivating factor behind the development of a number of alternate methods of measurement [2–5]

Estimated intake of dietary phyto-oestrogens in Australian women and evaluation of correlates of phyto-oestrogen intake.

The role of dietary phyto-oestrogens in health has been of continued interest and debate, but data available on the distribution of intake in the Australian diet are scarce. Therefore, we aimed to estimate phyto-oestrogen consumption in Australian women, describe the pattern of intake and identify correlates of high phyto-oestrogen intake. Study participants were 2078 control women (18-79 years) from two population-based case-control studies on gynaecological cancers (2002-2007). Dietary information was obtained using a 135-item FFQ, and the intakes of isoflavones, lignans, enterolignans and coumestans, including their individual components, were estimated using a database of phyto-oestrogen content in food developed in the UK. Median total intake (energy-adjusted) of phyto-oestrogens was 1·29 mg/d, including 611 µg/d isoflavones, 639 µg/d lignans, 21 µg/d enterolignans and 8 µg/d coumestrol. Both isoflavone and lignan intakes were strongly skewed towards higher values and positively correlated with age. Women consumed on average two servings of soyabean foods/week. Compared to lower phyto-oestrogen consumers (≤1·29 mg/d, median split), higher phyto-oestrogen consumers (>1·29 mg/d) were slightly older, less likely to be smokers, had a higher educational and physical activity level, lower BMI, lower intake of dietary fat, and higher intake of fibre, selected micronutrients and soyabean foods (all P < 0·03). The daily intake of phyto-oestrogens in Australian women with predominantly Caucasian ethnicity is approximately 1 mg; this is similar to other Western populations, but considerably lower than that among Asian women. However, those with a relatively high phyto-oestrogen diet seem to have a healthier lifestyle and a more favourable dietary profile compared to others

Communication style and exercise compliance in physiotherapy (CONNECT). A cluster randomized controlled trial to test a theory-based intervention to increase chronic low back pain patients’ adherence to physiotherapists’ recommendations: study rationale, design, and methods

Physical activity and exercise therapy are among the accepted clinical rehabilitation guidelines and are recommended self-management strategies for chronic low back pain. However, many back pain sufferers do not adhere to their physiotherapist’s recommendations. Poor patient adherence may decrease the effectiveness of advice and home-based rehabilitation exercises. According to self-determination theory, support from health care practitioners can promote patients’ autonomous motivation and greater long-term behavioral persistence (e.g., adherence to physiotherapists’ recommendations). The aim of this trial is to assess the effect of an intervention designed to increase physiotherapists’ autonomy-supportive communication on low back pain patients’ adherence to physical activity and exercise therapy recommendations. \ud \ud This study will be a single-blinded cluster randomized controlled trial. Outpatient physiotherapy centers (N =12) in Dublin, Ireland (population = 1.25 million) will be randomly assigned using a computer-generated algorithm to either the experimental or control arm. Physiotherapists in the experimental arm (two hospitals and four primary care clinics) will attend eight hours of communication skills training. Training will include handouts, workbooks, video examples, role-play, and discussion designed to teach physiotherapists how to communicate in a manner that promotes autonomous patient motivation. Physiotherapists in the waitlist control arm (two hospitals and four primary care clinics) will not receive this training. Participants (N = 292) with chronic low back pain will complete assessments at baseline, as well as 1 week, 4 weeks, 12 weeks, and 24 weeks after their first physiotherapy appointment. Primary outcomes will include adherence to physiotherapy recommendations, as well as low back pain, function, and well-being. Participants will be blinded to treatment allocation, as they will not be told if their physiotherapist has received the communication skills training. Outcome assessors will also be blinded. \ud \ud We will use linear mixed modeling to test between arm differences both in the mean levels and the rates of change of the outcome variables. We will employ structural equation modeling to examine the process of change, including hypothesized mediation effects. \ud \ud This trial will be the first to test the effect of a self-determination theory-based communication skills training program for physiotherapists on their low back pain patients’ adherence to rehabilitation recommendations. Current Controlled Trials ISRCTN63723433\u

Effects of implantation of bone marrow cells on cytokine levels in the ischemic heart tissue. An experimental study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>In order to achieve a safe and persistent angiogenic effect, we investigated the potential of bone marrow cells implantation to enhance angiogenesis of ischemic hearts in a rat model, and also we have investigated growth factors accompanying and intermediating the angiogenesis, and the changes occurring in the levels of cytokines and their relations with angiogenesis.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>30 adult male Wistar albino rats from the same colony were used. After anterior myocardial infarction induced by occlusion of the left anterior descending artery, they were divided into two groups (Group I and Group II). 2 × 10⁷bone marrow cells suspended in 0.1 ml phosphate-buffered saline solution and 0.1 ml phosphate-buffered saline solution were injected at six points in the infarcted area in Group I and Group II respectively. Changes in the vascular density and, vascular endothelial growth factor, vascular cell adhesion molecule and cytokine levels in the infarcted myocardium after bone marrow cells implantation were examined.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>The implantation assay showed that bone marrow cells induced angiogenesis. Light microscopic analysis of the vascular density in the ischemic area showed that, angiogenesis had been induced to higher in Group I than Group II. Levels of vascular endothelial growth factor, vascular cell adhesion molecule and the inflammatory cytokines such as interleukin-1 and tumor necrosis factor-α in Group I were significantly elevated compared with those in Group II.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Bone marrow cells implantation induced angiogenesis in a rat ischemic heart model as a result of increase of the levels of vascular endothelial growth factor, vascular cell adhesion molecule, interleukin-1, and tumor necrosis factor-α.</p

Juvenile idiopathic arthritis polygenic risk scores are associated with cardiovascular phenotypes in early adulthood: a phenome-wide association study

This is the final version. Available on open access from BMC via the DOI in this recordAvailability of data and materials: The informed consent obtained from ALSPAC participants does not allow the data to be made freely available through any third party maintained public repository. However, data used for this submission can be made available on request to the ALSPAC Executive. The ALSPAC data management plan describes in detail the policy regarding data sharing, which is through a system of managed open access. Full instructions for applying for data access can be found here: http://www.bristol.ac.uk/alspac/researchers/access/. The ALSPAC study website contains details of all the data that are available (http://www.bristol.ac.uk/alspac/researchers/our-data/). A version of the R script used in this analysis is available at https://github.com/sc3170/JIA-polygenic-risk-and-cardiovascular-phenotypes.BACKGROUND: There is growing concern about the long-term cardiovascular health of patients with juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA). In this study we assessed the association between JIA polygenic risk and cardiovascular phenotypes (cardiovascular risk factors, early atherosclerosis/arteriosclerosis markers, and cardiac structure and function measures) early in life. METHODS: JIA polygenic risk scores (PRSs) were constructed for 2,815 participants from the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children, using the single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) weights from the most recent JIA genome wide association study. The association between JIA PRSs and cardiovascular phenotypes at age 24 years was assessed using linear and logistic regression. For outcomes with strong evidence of association, further analysis was undertaken to examine how early in life (from age seven onwards) these associations manifest. RESULTS: The JIA PRS was associated with diastolic blood pressure (β 0.062, 95% CI 0.026 to 0.099, P = 0.001), insulin (β 0.050, 95% CI 0.011 to 0.090, P = 0.013), insulin resistance index (HOMA2_IR, β 0.054, 95% CI 0.014 to 0.095, P = 0.009), log hsCRP (β 0.053, 95% CI 0.011 to 0.095, P = 0.014), waist circumference (β 0.041, 95% CI 0.007 to 0.075, P = 0.017), fat mass index (β 0.049, 95% CI 0.016 to 0.083, P = 0.004) and body mass index (β 0.046, 95% CI 0.011 to 0.081, P = 0.010). For anthropometric measures and diastolic blood pressure, there was suggestive evidence of association with JIA PRS from age seven years. The findings were consistent across multiple sensitivity analyses. CONCLUSIONS: Genetic liability to JIA is associated with multiple cardiovascular risk factors, supporting the hypothesis of increased cardiovascular risk in JIA. Our findings suggest that cardiovascular risk is a core feature of JIA, rather than secondary to the disease activity/treatment, and that cardiovascular risk counselling should form part of patient care

People living with facial disfigurement after having had noma disease: a systematic review of the literature

Noma disease often results in impairment, morbidity and severe facial disfigurement. This article reports a systematic review of literatures published between 2006 and 2015 to establish existing knowledge about social stigma associated with facial disfigurements. Five databases were searched and 114 citations were screened, of which only 15 met the relevant criteria. Titles and abstracts of the retrieved articles were independently reviewed. The research was heterogeneous; therefore, overall synthesis using meta-analysis was inappropriate. It can be seen that the review demonstrates that facial disfigurements are far more complex than was previously thought

Wide-Scale Analysis of Human Functional Transcription Factor Binding Reveals a Strong Bias towards the Transcription Start Site

We introduce a novel method to screen the promoters of a set of genes with shared biological function, against a precompiled library of motifs, and find those motifs which are statistically over-represented in the gene set. The gene sets were obtained from the functional Gene Ontology (GO) classification; for each set and motif we optimized the sequence similarity score threshold, independently for every location window (measured with respect to the TSS), taking into account the location dependent nucleotide heterogeneity along the promoters of the target genes. We performed a high throughput analysis, searching the promoters (from 200bp downstream to 1000bp upstream the TSS), of more than 8000 human and 23,000 mouse genes, for 134 functional Gene Ontology classes and for 412 known DNA motifs. When combined with binding site and location conservation between human and mouse, the method identifies with high probability functional binding sites that regulate groups of biologically related genes. We found many location-sensitive functional binding events and showed that they clustered close to the TSS. Our method and findings were put to several experimental tests. By allowing a "flexible" threshold and combining our functional class and location specific search method with conservation between human and mouse, we are able to identify reliably functional TF binding sites. This is an essential step towards constructing regulatory networks and elucidating the design principles that govern transcriptional regulation of expression. The promoter region proximal to the TSS appears to be of central importance for regulation of transcription in human and mouse, just as it is in bacteria and yeast.Comment: 31 pages, including Supplementary Information and figure

Plastic and Heritable Components of Phenotypic Variation in Nucella lapillus: An Assessment Using Reciprocal Transplant and Common Garden Experiments

Assessment of plastic and heritable components of phenotypic variation is crucial for understanding the evolution of adaptive character traits in heterogeneous environments. We assessed the above in relation to adaptive shell morphology of the rocky intertidal snail Nucella lapillus by reciprocal transplantation of snails between two shores differing in wave action and rearing snails of the same provenance in a common garden. Results were compared with those reported for similar experiments conducted elsewhere. Microsatellite variation indicated limited gene flow between the populations. Intrinsic growth rate was greater in exposed-site than sheltered-site snails, but the reverse was true of absolute growth rate, suggesting heritable compensation for reduced foraging opportunity at the exposed site. Shell morphology of reciprocal transplants partially converged through plasticity toward that of native snails. Shell morphology of F2s in the common garden partially retained characteristics of the P-generation, suggesting genetic control. A maternal effect was revealed by greater resemblance of F1s than F2s to the P-generation. The observed synergistic effects of plastic, maternal and genetic control of shell-shape may be expected to maximise fitness when environmental characteristics become unpredictable through dispersal

Detection of the pairwise kinematic Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect with BOSS DR11 and the Atacama Cosmology Telescope

We present a new measurement of the kinematic Sunyaev-Zeldovich effect using data from the Atacama Cosmology Telescope (ACT) and the Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey (BOSS). Using 600 square degrees of overlapping sky area, we evaluate the mean pairwise baryon momentum associated with the positions of 50,000 bright galaxies in the BOSS DR11 Large Scale Structure catalog. A non-zero signal arises from the large-scale motions of halos containing the sample galaxies. The data fits an analytical signal model well, with the optical depth to microwave photon scattering as a free parameter determining the overall signal amplitude. We estimate the covariance matrix of the mean pairwise momentum as a function of galaxy separation, using microwave sky simulations, jackknife evaluation, and bootstrap estimates. The most conservative simulation-based errors give signal-to-noise estimates between 3.6 and 4.1 for varying galaxy luminosity cuts. We discuss how the other error determinations can lead to higher signal-to-noise values, and consider the impact of several possible systematic errors. Estimates of the optical depth from the average thermal Sunyaev-Zeldovich signal at the sample galaxy positions are broadly consistent with those obtained from the mean pairwise momentum signal.Comment: 15 pages, 8 figures, 2 table