Investigation of foamed metals for application on space capsules annual report, 29 jun. 1963 - 15 aug. 1964

Foamed metal development for space capsules - brazing, variable density beam, thermal testing, mechanical tests, and machinin

Surveyor spacecraft system - Surveyor 6 flight performance Final report

Surveyor 6 spacecraft flight performance characteristics, including data on television equipment, alpha scattering experiment, and powered flight translatio

Assessing satisfaction with social care services among black and minority ethnic and white British carers of stroke survivors in England

Overall satisfaction levels with social care are usually high but lower levels have been reported among black and minority ethnic (BME) service users in England. Reasons for this are poorly understood. This qualitative study therefore explored satisfaction with services among informal carer participants from five different ethnic groups. Fifty-seven carers (black Caribbean, black African, Asian Indian, Asian Pakistani and white British) were recruited from voluntary sector organisations and a local hospital in England, and took part in semi-structured interviews using cognitive interviewing and the critical incident technique. Interviews took place from summer 2013 to spring 2014. Thematic analysis of the interviews showed that participants often struggled to identify specific ‘incidents’, especially satisfactory ones. When describing satisfactory services, participants talked mostly about specific individuals and relationships. Unsatisfactory experiences centred on services overall. When rating services using cognitive interviewing, explicit comparisons with expectations or experiences with other services were common. Highest satisfaction ratings tended to be justified by positive personal characteristics among practitioners, trust and relationships. Lower level ratings were mostly explained by inconsistency in services, insufficient or poor care. Lowest level ratings were rare. Overall, few differences between ethnic groups were identified, although white British participants rated services higher overall giving more top ratings. White British participants also frequently took a more overall view of services, highlighting some concerns but still giving top ratings, while South Asian carers in particular focused on negative aspects of services. Together these methods provide insight into what participants mean by satisfactory and unsatisfactory services. Cognitive interviewing was more challenging for some BME participants, possibly a reflection of the meaningfulness of the concept of service satisfaction to them. Future research should include comparisons between BME and white participants’ understanding of the most positive parts of satisfaction scales and should focus on dissatisfied participants

Drift of Aquatic Insects in the Brazos River, Texas

The objective of this study was to elucidate the nature and extent of drift by the aquatic insect populations of the Brazos River, Texas

Characterizing the genetic basis of copper toxicity in Drosophila reveals a complex pattern of allelic, regulatory, and behavioral variation

A range of heavy metals are required for normal cell function and homeostasis. However, the anthropogenic release of metal compounds into soil and water sources presents a pervasive health threat. Copper is one of many heavy metals that negatively impacts diverse organisms at a global scale. Using a combination of quantitative trait locus (QTL) mapping and RNA sequencing in the Drosophila Synthetic Population Resource, we demonstrate that resistance to the toxic effects of ingested copper in D. melanogaster is genetically complex and influenced by allelic and expression variation at multiple loci. QTL mapping identified several QTL that account for a substantial fraction of heritability. Additionally, we find that copper resistance is impacted by variation in behavioral avoidance of copper and may be subject to life-stage specific regulation. Gene expression analysis further demonstrated that resistant and sensitive strains are characterized by unique expression patterns. Several of the candidate genes identified via QTL mapping and RNAseq have known copper-specific functions (e.g., Ccs, Sod3, CG11825), and others are involved in the regulation of other heavy metals (e.g., Catsup, whd). We validated several of these candidate genes with RNAi suggesting they contribute to variation in adult copper resistance. Our study illuminates the interconnected roles that allelic and expression variation, organism life stage, and behavior play in copper resistance, allowing a deeper understanding of the diverse mechanisms through which metal pollution can negatively impact organisms

Exploring the Potential Role of Family History of Hypertension on Racial Differences in Sympathetic Vascular Transduction

The prevalence of hypertension in Non-Hispanic Black (BL) men surpasses all other racial groups. Our laboratory has previously demonstrated exaggerated vasoconstrictor and blood pressure (BP) responses to spontaneous bursts of muscle sympathetic nerve activity (MSNA; sympathetic vascular transduction) in young, healthy BL men compared to their Non-Hispanic White (WH) counterparts. Because a family history of hypertension (FHH) further compounds cardiovascular risk, we wanted to begin to explore the potential impact of a positive (+) FHH on sympathetic vascular transduction. Whether a +FHH influences sympathetic vascular transduction in WH and/or BL men remains unknown. PURPOSE: To begin to explore if +FHH influences sympathetic vascular transduction within and between racial groups. METHODS: 22 men, nine with a +FHH (4 BL men) and 13 without a FHH (-FHH; 6 BL men) were recruited. Beat-to-beat BP (Finometer), femoral artery blood flow (Doppler ultrasound), and MSNA were measured during a 20-minute quiet rest. The mean BP and leg vascular conductance (LVC; blood flow/mean BP) responses to spontaneous bursts of MSNA were quantified via a signal averaging technique. RESULTS: Resting heart rate, BP, and MSNA were not significantly different between groups (all p\u3e0.05). As previously demonstrated by our laboratory, the BL men exhibited an augmented sympathetic vascular transduction compared to the WH men (e.g., peak BP response, WH men: Δ4.1±0.3, BL men: Δ5.6±0.7 mmHg, p=0.04). When accounting for FHH within the groups, the peak BP (WH +FHH: Δ4.4±0.6 vs. WH -FHH: Δ3.8±0.4 mmHg, p=0.4) and nadir LVC responses (WH +FHH: Δ-0.5±0.07 vs. WH -FHH: Δ-0.5±0.09 ml·min-¹·mmHg-¹, p=0.7) were not significantly different between WH men +FHH and WH men –FHH. Likewise, the BL men +FHH exhibited similar peak BP (BL +FHH: Δ6.2±0.7 vs. BL -FHH: Δ5.3±1.1 mmHg, p=0.5) and nadir LVC (BL +FHH: Δ-1.1±0.44 vs. BL -FHH: Δ-0.6±0.10 ml·min-¹·mmHg-¹, p=0.2) responses to bursts of MSNA compared to the BL men –FHH. CONCLUSION: These preliminary findings do not support a role for +FHH in augmented sympathetic vascular transduction, therefore suggesting that racial differences in sympathetic vascular transduction are independent of FHH

Brief of Scholars of the History and Original Meaning of the Fourth Amendment as Amici Curiae in Support of Petitioner, Carpenter v. United States, No. 16-402 (U.S. Aug. 14, 2017)

Obtaining and examining cell site location records to find a person is a “search” in any normal sense of the word — a search of documents and a search for a person and her personal effects. It is therefore a “search” within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment in that it constitutes “examining,” “exploring,” “looking through,” “inquiring,” “seeking,” or “trying to find.” Nothing about the text of the Fourth Amendment, or the historical backdrop against which it was adopted, suggests that “search” should be construed more narrowly as, for example, intrusions upon subjectively manifested expectations of privacy that society is prepared to recognize as reasonable.Entrusting government agents with unfettered discretion to conduct searches using cell site location information undermines Fourth Amendment rights. The Amendment guarantees “[t]he right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches.” The Framers chose that language deliberately. It reflected the insecurity they suffered at the hands of “writs of assistance,” a form of general warrant that granted state agents broad discretion to search wherever they pleased. Such arbitrary power was “unreasonable” to the Framers, being “against the reason of the common law,” and it was intolerable because of its oppressive impact on “the people” as a whole. As emphasized in one of the seminal English cases that inspired the Amendment, this kind of general power to search was “totally subversive of the liberty of the subject.” James Otis’s famous speech denouncing a colonial writ of assistance similarly condemned those writs as “the worst instrument of arbitrary power,” placing “the liberty of every man in the hands of every petty officer.” Thus, although those who drafted and ratified the Fourth Amendment could not have anticipated cellphone technology, they would have recognized the dangers inherent in any state claim of unlimited authority to conduct searches for evidence of criminal activity. Cell site location information provides insight into where we go and what we do. Because this information is constantly generated and can be retrieved by the government long after the activities it memorializes have taken place, unfettered government access to cell site location information raises the specter of general searches and undermines the security of “the people.