Longitudinal Changes in Ultrasound-Assessed Femoral Cartilage Thickness in Individuals from 4 to 6 Months Following Anterior Cruciate Ligament Reconstruction

Objective: Diagnostic ultrasound provides a valid assessment of cartilage health that has been used to observe cross-sectional cartilage thickness differences post-ACLR (anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction), but has not been used longitudinally during early recovery post-ACLR. Design: The purpose of this study was to assess longitudinal changes in femoral cartilage thickness via ultrasound in individuals at 4 to 6 months post-ACLR and compared to healthy controls. Twenty participants (50% female, age = 21.1 ± 5.7 years) completed testing sessions 4 and 6 months post-ACLR. Thirty healthy controls (57% female, age = 20.8 ± 3.8 years) without knee injury history completed 2 testing sessions (>72 hours apart). Femoral cartilage ultrasound images were captured bilaterally in ACLR participants and in the dominant limb of healthy controls during all sessions. Average cartilage thicknesses in the medial, intercondylar, and lateral femoral regions were determined using a semi-automated processing technique. Results: When comparing cartilage thickness mean differences or changes over time, individuals post-ACLR did not demonstrate between limb differences (P-range = 0.50-0.92), limb differences compared to healthy controls (P-range = 0.19-0.94), or changes over time (P-range = 0.22-0.72) for any femoral cartilage thickness region. However, participants demonstrated cartilage thickening (45%) or thinning (35%) that exceeded minimal detectable change (MDC) from 4 to 6 months post-ACLR, respectively. Conclusions: Using MDC scores may help better identify within-subject femoral cartilage thickness changes longitudinally post-ACLR due to bidirectional cartilage thickness changes

Mindful Parenting in Mental Health Care

Mindfulness is a form of meditation based on the Buddhist tradition, which has been used over the last two decades to successfully treat a multitude of mental health problems. Bringing mindfulness into parenting (“mindful parenting”) is one of the applications of mindfulness. Mindful parenting interventions are increasingly being used to help prevent and treat mental disorders in children, parenting problems, and prevent intergenerational transmission of mental disorders from parents to children. However, to date, few studies have examined the hypothesized mechanisms of change brought about by mindful parenting. We discuss six possible mechanisms through which mindful parenting may bring about change in parent–child interactions in the context of child and parent mental health problems. These mechanisms are hypothesized to be mediated by the effects of mindfulness on parental attention by: (1) reducing parental stress and resulting parental reactivity; (2) reducing parental preoccupation resulting from parental and/or child psychopathology; (3) improving parental executive functioning in impulsive parents; (4) breaking the cycle of intergenerational transmission of dysfunctional parenting schemas and habits; (5) increasing self-nourishing attention; and (6) improving marital functioning and co-parenting. We review research that has applied mindful parenting in mental health settings, with a focus on evidence for these six mechanisms. Finally, we discuss directions for future research into mindful parenting and the crucial questions that this research should strive to answer

of oxide dispersion strengthened nickel-based superalloy PM 1000

In this study, an artificial neural network model was developed to predict the thermal-mechanical fatigue life and pure isothermal low-cycle fatigue life of oxide dispersion strengthened nickel-based superalloy PM 1000. The input parameters to the model consisted of the concentration of five inputs: mean temperature, temperature amplitude, mean total strain, total strain amplitude, and heating/cooling rate. The calculated results fit perfectly with the experimental data in both types of fatigue experiments. Furthermore, the interactions between heating/cooling rate and thermal-mechanical fatigue life were estimated based on the obtained artificial neural network model

dispersion strengthened nickel-based superalloy PM1000

Many studies of thermal-mechanical fatigue behaviour address steels, nickel-base superalloys or fiber-reinforced titanium alloys, but only rough data are available for powder metallurgical high-temperature materials. In this study, the cyclic deformation and lifetime behaviour of the powder metallurgical nickel-base superalloy PM1000 were investigated under thermal-mechanical fatigue conditions. Thermal-mechanical fatigue tests were performed in the temperature range of 450-850 degrees C. The phase angle between the mechanical strain and the thermal cycle (-135 degrees) is closely related to the appropriate operating conditions in aero-engines. Thermal-mechanical fatigue results were compared with isothermal fatigue results reported in the literature for test temperatures of 850 and 1000 degrees C. Results revealed that isothermal fatigue exhibited a longer lifetime than thermal-mechanical fatigue at corresponding mechanical strain amplitude. in thermal-mechanical fatigue loading, cracks tended to initiate intergranularly and propagate transgranularly. Life prediction models were developed and compared to evaluate the possibility of predicting both thermal-mechanical fatigue and isothermal fatigue lifetimes. (C) 2008 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved

Methodical grounds of monitoring of the agricultural organizations, having in its composition of potential sources of accidents and disasters

The article presents a methodological framework developed by the authors with the aim of developing methods of forecasting, prevention of emergency situations (es), and also increase of stability of functioning of the organizations of the Ministry of agriculture of Russia, having in composition the existing object predstavlyayushie danger, and aims to increase the efficiency of state control over security. The unsatisfactory financial position of ogranicheniyami, having in its composition of potentially dangerous objects, is an additional risk factor man-made disaster that needs to be considered when conducting security control. The purpose of financial monitoring is to determine associations with increased risk of occurrence of accidents on the basis of objective assessment of their financial and economic state that will allow timely monitoring of inspections by the state Supervisory authorities in advance and to take the necessary preventive measures

Intergenerational Transmission of Emotion Dysregulation Through Parental Invalidation of Emotions: Implications for Adolescent Internalizing and Externalizing Behaviors

We examined parent emotion dysregulation as part of a model of family emotion-related processes and adolescent psychopathology. Participants were 80 parent– adolescent dyads (mean age = 13.6; 79 % African-American and 17 % Caucasian) with diverse family composition and socioeconomic status. Parent and adolescent dyads self-reported on their emotion regulation difficulties and adolescents reported on their perceptions of parent invalidation (i.e., punishment and neglect) of emotions and their own internalizing and externalizing behaviors. Results showed that parents who reported higher levels of emotion dysregulation tended to invalidate their adolescent’s emotional expressions more often, which in turn related to higher levels of adolescent emotion dysregulation. Additionally, adolescent-reported emotion dysregulation mediated the relation between parent invalidation of emotions and adolescent internalizing and externalizing behaviors. Potential applied implications are discussed