IVR Test & Survey: A Computer Program to Collect Data Via Computerized Telephonic Applications

Several studies have demonstrated the advantages of using interactive voice response (IVR) technology to collect self-report data from research participants and recipients of psychological/medical services. IVR allows participants to phone a computer and respond to recorded questions by pressing the appropriate touch-tone keys on their telephone. Because this technology offers substantial benefits in terms of cost and efficiency, it is surprising that it has not been more widely utilized by researchers and practitioners. Along with the automation of the administration and scoring of tests or surveys, IVR provides for questioning to be adapted to the participants\u27 responses. One possible explanation for the failure to exploit this technology is the absence of easy-to-use software that does not require programming knowledge. This article describes IVR Test & Survey, a program to facilitate the administration, scoring, and analysis of information collected with the use of IVR technology

Infrared photochemistry of ethylene clusters

Infrared irradiation of ethylene clusters formed in supersonic molecular beams, using a low power cw CO2 laser, results in the photodissociation of a large fraction of the van der Waals molecules. Under such conditions, infrared absorption intensity exhibits first-order power dependence and is readily detected as loss in molecular beam intensity. Intramolecular energy transfer rates, determined by measuring spectral linewidths, are shown to vary with the vibrational mode initially excited. Ethylene clusters containing one quantum of vibrational energy corresponding to the nun7 fundamental in the monomer (949 cm^–1) have a vibrationally predissociative lifetime of 0.33 psec. In comparison, the relaxation rate of ethylene-d4 clusters with one quantum of excitation corresponding to the nu12 (1078 cm^–1) mode of C2D4 is 0.7 psec

Renewal of the Cadastral Map by New Mapping

Předmětem bakalářské práce je obnova katastrálního operátu novým mapováním. Podrobně jsou popsány jednotlivé etapy obnovy novým mapováním. V úvodu práce je popsán vývoj evidence nemovitostí na území České republiky. Hlavní část je věnována obnově katastrálního operátu novým mapováním a jednotlivých etap spojených s obnovou. V závěrečné kapitole je provedeno zhodnocení celé obnovy katastrálního operátu a pracovníků, kteří se obnovou katastrální ho operátu zabývají.The subject of the bachelor thesis is the renewal of the cadastral map by new mapping. The individual stages of recovery by new mapping are described in detail. The introduction describes the development of real estate records in the Czech Republic. The main part is devoted to the renewal of the cadastral map by new mapping and individual stages associated with the renewal. The final chapter evaluates the entire renewal of the cadastral register and the staff who deal with the renewal of the cadastral register.544 - Katedra geodézie a důlního měřictvívýborn

Muscle recruitment patterns during the prone leg extension

BACKGROUND: The prone leg extension (PLE) is a clinical test used to evaluate the function of the lumbopelvis. It has been theorized that a normal and consistent pattern of muscle activation exists. Previous research has found two contradictory patterns of muscle activation during PLE in normal individuals. One study shows an almost simultaneous activation of the lower erector spinae and hamstring muscle group with a delayed activation of the gluteus maximus, while the second describes the order of activation being ipsilateral erector spinae (to the leg being extended), hamstrings, contralateral erector spinae and gluteus maximus. Due to the different conclusions from these two studies and the lack of quantified muscle onset times, expressed in absolute time this study attempted to quantify the muscle onset times (in milliseconds) during the prone leg extension, while noting if a consistent order of activation exists and whether a timing relationship also exists between the gluteus maximus and contralateral latissimus dorsi. METHODS: 10 asymptomatic males (Average height: 175.2 cm (SD 6.5), Average Weight 75.9 kg (SD 6.5), Average Age: 27.1(SD 1.28)) and 4 asymptomatic females (Average height 164.5 (SD 2.9), weight: 56.2 (SD 8.9), Average Age: 25 (SD 1)) performed the prone leg extension task while the myoelectric signal was recorded from the bilateral lower erector spinae, gluteus maximus and hamstring muscle groups. Activation onsets were determined from the rectified EMG signal relative to the onset of the hamstrings muscle group. RESULTS: No consistent recruitment patterns were detected for prone leg extension among the hamstring muscle group and the erector spinae. However, a consistent delay in the Gluteus Maximus firing of approximately 370 ms after the first muscle activated was found. Five out of 14 asymptomatic subjects showed a delay in gluteus maximus firing exceeding the average delay found in previous research of subjects considered to have a dysfunctional firing pattern. CONCLUSION: A consistent pattern of activation was not found. Variability was seen across subjects. These findings suggest the PLE is not sufficient for a diagnostic test due to the notable physiological variation. An overlap between normal and potentially abnormal activation patterns may exist

ArchCity Defenders: Municipal Courts White Paper

ArchCity Defenders represents St. Louis\u27 indigent on a pro bono basis in criminal and civil legal matters while working closely with social service providers to connect clients with services. Our primary goal is to remove the legal barriers preventing our clients from accessing the housing, job training, and treatment they need to get on with their lives. In the five years we have been doing this work, we have primarily focused on representation in the municipal courts that have jurisdiction over infractions for mostly traffic-related offenses. Our direct representation of clients in these courts and the stories they shared of their experiences prompted us to conduct a court watching program to more closely observe the impact the municipal court system has on our clients\u27 lives

Outdoor Worker Sun Protection Project : a mixed methods intervention to improve sun safety among outdoor workers

Queensland, Australia has one of the highest rates of skin cancer in the world. Outdoor workers are regularly exposed to high doses of ultraviolet radiation, and are at increased risk to develop non-melanoma and melanoma skin cancers. In 2010, a health promotion intervention to improve sun protection among outdoor workers in Queensland commenced. The intervention employed a mixed methods approach and a participatory action research framework. Fourteen workplaces were recruited from building and construction, rural and farming, local government, and public sector organisations. Management and workers were engaged in cycles of assessment, reflection and discussion, planning, implementation and reassessing, over a 14-month intervention period. Overall, at least one workplace representative from each workplace (range 1-3) and in depth focus groups were held with a subset of workers (range 3-16) to assess sun safe behaviours pre and post intervention. Workers’ attitudes, beliefs, knowledge and willingness to engage in sun protection differed depending on workplace characteristics and support. A familiar theme among workers spoke of sun safety as being “common sense” and the “workers individual responsibility”. Often there was a discrepancy in the perceptions of the workers, compared to the view of workplace representatives and the workplaces position or policy on sun safety. In larger workplaces, especially Government Departments, workers were more aware and followed sun safe practices compared to smaller workplaces where sun safety was not a high priority. These results indicate that a workplace culture which places high values on safety and polices more broadly may also have a positive effect on sun safety among outdoor workers as well. In addition, the specific characteristics of the workplace and the outdoor work tasks influence workers willingness to engage in sun safety measures

Outdoor Worker Sun Protection Project : a mixed methods intervention to improve sun safety among outdoor workers

Queensland, Australia has one of the highest rates of skin cancer in the world. Outdoor workers are regularly exposed to high doses of ultraviolet radiation, and are at increased risk to develop non-melanoma and melanoma skin cancers. In 2010, a health promotion intervention to improve sun protection among outdoor workers in Queensland commenced. The intervention employed a mixed methods approach and a participatory action research framework. Fourteen workplaces were recruited from building and construction, rural and farming, local government, and public sector organisations. Management and workers were engaged in cycles of assessment, reflection and discussion, planning, implementation and reassessing, over a 14-month intervention period. Overall, at least one workplace representative from each workplace (range 1-3) and in depth focus groups were held with a subset of workers (range 3-16) to assess sun safe behaviours pre and post intervention. Workers’ attitudes, beliefs, knowledge and willingness to engage in sun protection differed depending on workplace characteristics and support. A familiar theme among workers spoke of sun safety as being “common sense” and the “workers individual responsibility”. Often there was a discrepancy in the perceptions of the workers, compared to the view of workplace representatives and the workplaces position or policy on sun safety. In larger workplaces, especially Government Departments, workers were more aware and followed sun safe practices compared to smaller workplaces where sun safety was not a high priority. These results indicate that a workplace culture which places high values on safety and polices more broadly may also have a positive effect on sun safety among outdoor workers as well. In addition, the specific characteristics of the workplace and the outdoor work tasks influence workers willingness to engage in sun safety measures

In Vitro Study of Amniotic Fluid Gram Stain: Effect of Centrifugation

Objective: Gram stain of amniotic fluid (AF) is used to detect intraamniotic infection. The purpose of this study was to determine if centrifugation improved the ability of AF Gram stain to detect bacteria

Diagnosing Capnocytophaga canimorsus Infections

We reviewed clinical and epidemiologic features of 56 human Capnocytophaga canimorsus isolates submitted during a 32-year period to California's Microbial Diseases Laboratory for identification. An increasing number of isolates identified as C. canimorsus have been submitted since 1990. Many laboratories still have difficulty correctly identifying this species

H2rs: Deducing evolutionary and functionally important residue positions by means of an entropy and similarity based analysis of multiple sequence alignments

Background The identification of functionally important residue positions is an important task of computational biology. Methods of correlation analysis allow for the identification of pairs of residue positions, whose occupancy is mutually dependent due to constraints imposed by protein structure or function. A common measure assessing these dependencies is the mutual information, which is based on Shannon’s information theory that utilizes probabilities only. Consequently, such approaches do not consider the similarity of residue pairs, which may degrade the algorithm’s performance. One typical algorithm is H2r, which characterizes each individual residue position k by the conn(k)-value, which is the number of significantly correlated pairs it belongs to. Results To improve specificity of H2r, we developed a revised algorithm, named H2rs, which is based on the von Neumann entropy (vNE). To compute the corresponding mutual information, a matrix A is required, which assesses the similarity of residue pairs. We determined A by deducing substitution frequencies from contacting residue pairs observed in the homologs of 35 809 proteins, whose structure is known. In analogy to H2r, the enhanced algorithm computes a normalized conn(k)-value. Within the framework of H2rs, only statistically significant vNE values were considered. To decide on significance, the algorithm calculates a p-value by performing a randomization test for each individual pair of residue positions. The analysis of a large in silico testbed demonstrated that specificity and precision were higher for H2rs than for H2r and two other methods of correlation analysis. The gain in prediction quality is further confirmed by a detailed assessment of five well-studied enzymes. The outcome of H2rs and of a method that predicts contacting residue positions (PSICOV) overlapped only marginally. H2rs can be downloaded from http://www-bioinf.uni-regensburg.de webcite. Conclusions Considering substitution frequencies for residue pairs by means of the von Neumann entropy and a p-value improved the success rate in identifying important residue positions. The integration of proven statistical concepts and normalization allows for an easier comparison of results obtained with different proteins. Comparing the outcome of the local method H2rs and of the global method PSICOV indicates that such methods supplement each other and have different scopes of application