The darker side of personality:Narcissism predicts moral disengagement and antisocial behavior in sport

Despite a plethora of research on moral disengagement and antisocial behavior, there is a dearth of literature that explores personality in the context of these undesirable attitudes and behaviors. We provide the first examination of personality, specifically narcissism, as a predictor of moral disengagement and antisocial behavior in sport. Given that narcissism is negatively related to empathy and positively related to feelings of entitlement, it is more likely for narcissists to disengage morally and to behave antisocially. We thus hypothesized that narcissism would predict antisocial behavior via moral disengagement. Across 12 team contact sports (n = 272), bootstrapped mediation analyses confirmed this indirect effect, which remained significant when controlling for motivational climate, social desirability, sex and sport type. Coaches and practitioners would do well to consider the darker side of personality in targeting moral disengagement and its behavioral consequences in team sports.</jats:p

Recapture or precapture? Fallibility of standard capture-recapture methods in the presence of referrals between sources.

Capture-recapture methods, largely developed in ecology, are now commonly used in epidemiology to adjust for incomplete registries and to estimate the size of difficult-to-reach populations such as problem drug users. Overlapping lists of individuals in the target population, taken from administrative data sources, are considered analogous to overlapping "captures" of animals. Log-linear models, incorporating interaction terms to account for dependencies between sources, are used to predict the number of unobserved individuals and, hence, the total population size. A standard assumption to ensure parameter identifiability is that the highest-order interaction term is 0. We demonstrate that, when individuals are referred directly between sources, this assumption will often be violated, and the standard modeling approach may lead to seriously biased estimates. We refer to such individuals as having been "precaptured," rather than truly recaptured. Although sometimes an alternative identifiable log-linear model could accommodate the referral structure, this will not always be the case. Further, multiple plausible models may fit the data equally well but provide widely varying estimates of the population size. We demonstrate an alternative modeling approach, based on an interpretable parameterization and driven by careful consideration of the relationships between the sources, and we make recommendations for capture-recapture in practice

Estimation of the direct health and indirect societal costs of diabetes in the UK using a cost of illness model

AimsThe direct cost of diabetes to the UK health system was estimated at around £10 billion in 2012. This analysis updates that estimate using more recent and accurate data sources.MethodsA pragmatic review of relevant data sources for UK nations was conducted, including population-level datasets and published literature, to generate estimates of costs separately for Type 1, Type 2 and gestational diabetes. A comprehensive cost framework, developed in collaboration with experts, was used to create a population-based cost of illness model. The key driver of the analysis was prevalence of diabetes and its complications. Estimates were made of the excess costs of diagnosis, treatment and diabetes-related complications compared with the general UK population. Estimates of the indirect costs of diabetes focused on productivity losses due to absenteeism and premature mortality.ResultsThe direct costs of diabetes in 2021/22 for the UK were estimated at £10.6 billion, of which just over 40% related to diagnosis and treatment, with the rest relating to the excess costs of complications. Indirect costs were estimated at £3.3 billion.Conclusions Diabetes remains a considerable cost burden in the UK and the majority of those costs are still spent on potentially preventable complications. Although rates of some complications are reducing, prevalence continues to increase and effective approaches to primary and secondary prevention continue to be needed. Improvements in data capture, data quality and reporting, and further research on the human and financial implications of increasing incidence of Type 2 diabetes in younger people are recommended.<br/

Focusing a NIR adaptive optics imager, experience with GSAOI

The Gemini South Adaptive Optics Imager (GSAOI) to be used with the Multi-Conjugate Adaptive Optics (MCAO) system at Gemini South is currently in the final stages of assembly and testing. GSAOI uses a suite of 26 different filters, made from both BK7 and Fused Silica substrates. These filters, located in a non-collimated beam, work as active optical elements. The optical design was undertaken to ensure that both the filter substrates both focused longitudinally at the same point. During the testing of the instrument it was found that longitudinal focus was filter dependant. The methods used to investigate this are outlined in the paper. These investigations identified several possible causes for the focal shift including substrate material properties in cryogenic conditions and small amounts of residual filter power

Imaging in Vascular Access

This review examines four imaging modalities; ultrasound (US), digital subtraction angiography (DSA), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and computed tomography (CT), that have common or potential applications in vascular access (VA). The four modalities are reviewed under their primary uses, techniques, advantages and disadvantages, and future directions that are specific to VA. Currently, US is the most commonly used modality in VA because it is cheaper (relative to other modalities), accessible, non-ionising, and does not require the use of contrast agents. DSA is predominantly only performed when an intervention is indicated. MRI is limited by its cost and the time required for image acquisition that mainly confines it to the realm of research where high resolution is required. CT’s short acquisition times and high resolution make it useful as a problem-solving tool in complex cases, although accessibility can be an issue. All four imaging modalities have advantages and disadvantages that limit their use in this particular patient cohort. Current imaging in VA comprises an integrated approach with each modality providing particular uses dependent on their capabilities. MRI and CT, which currently have limited use, may have increasingly important future roles in complex cases where detailed analysis is required

BLM and BRCA1-BARD1 coordinate complementary mechanisms of joint DNA molecule resolution

The Bloom syndrome helicase BLM interacts with topoisomerase IIIα (TOP3A), RMI1, and RMI2 to form the BTR complex, which dissolves double Holliday junctions and DNA replication intermediates to promote sister chromatid disjunction before cell division. In its absence, structure-specific nucleases like the SMX complex (comprising SLX1-SLX4, MUS81-EME1, and XPF-ERCC1) can cleave joint DNA molecules instead, but cells deficient in both BTR and SMX are not viable. Here, we identify a negative genetic interaction between BLM loss and deficiency in the BRCA1-BARD1 tumor suppressor complex. We show that this is due to a previously overlooked role for BARD1 in recruiting SLX4 to resolve DNA intermediates left unprocessed by BLM in the preceding interphase. Consequently, cells with defective BLM and BRCA1-BARD1 accumulate catastrophic levels of chromosome breakage and micronucleation, leading to cell death. Thus, we reveal mechanistic insights into SLX4 recruitment to DNA lesions, with potential clinical implications for treating BRCA1-deficient tumors

Estimating the prevalence of problem drug use from drug-related mortality data.

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: Indirect estimation methods are required for estimating the size of populations where only a proportion of individuals are observed directly, such as problem drug users (PDUs). Capture-recapture and multiplier methods are widely used, but have been criticized as subject to bias. We propose a new approach to estimating prevalence of PDU from numbers of fatal drug-related poisonings (fDRPs) using linked databases, addressing the key limitations of simplistic 'mortality multipliers'. METHODS: Our approach requires linkage of data on a large cohort of known PDUs to mortality registers and summary information concerning additional fDRPs observed outside this cohort. We model fDRP rates among the cohort and assume that rates in unobserved PDUs are equal to rates in the cohort during periods out of treatment. Prevalence is estimated in a Bayesian statistical framework, in which we simultaneously fit regression models to fDRP rates and prevalence, allowing both to vary by demographic factors and the former also by treatment status. RESULTS: We report a case study analysis, estimating the prevalence of opioid dependence in England in 2008/09, by gender, age group and geographical region. Overall prevalence was estimated as 0.82% (95% credible interval = 0.74-0.94%) of 15-64-year-olds, which is similar to a published estimate based on capture-recapture analysis. CONCLUSIONS: Our modelling approach estimates prevalence from drug-related mortality data, while addressing the main limitations of simplistic multipliers. This offers an alternative approach for the common situation where available data sources do not meet the strong assumptions required for valid capture-recapture estimation. In a case study analysis, prevalence estimates based on our approach were surprisingly similar to existing capture-recapture estimates but, we argue, are based on a much more objective and justifiable modelling approach

Negligible temperature dependence of the ozone–iodide reaction and implications for oceanic emissions of iodine

The reaction between ozone and iodide is one of the main drivers of tropospheric ozone deposition to the ocean due to the ubiquitous presence of iodide in the ocean surface and its rapid reaction with ozone. Despite the importance of this sea surface reaction for tropospheric ozone deposition and also as the major source of atmospheric iodine, there is uncertainty in its rate and dependence on aqueous-phase temperature. In this work, the kinetics of the heterogeneous second-order reaction between ozone and iodide are investigated using conditions applicable to coupled ocean–atmosphere systems (1 × 10−7–1 × 10−5 M iodide; 40 ppb ozone; 288–303 K; 15.0 psi). The determined Arrhenius parameters of A = 5.4 ± 23.0 × 1010 M-1s-1 and Ea = 7.0 ± 10.5 kJ mol−1 show that the reaction has a negligible positive temperature dependence, which could be weakly negative within errors. This is in contrast to a previous study that found a strong positive activation energy and a pre-exponential factor many orders of magnitude greater than determined here. The re-measured kinetics of ozone and iodide were used to constrain a state-of-the-art sea surface microlayer (SML) model. The model replicated results from a previous laboratory study of the temperature dependence of hypoiodous acid (HOI) and molecular iodine (I2) emissions from an ozone-oxidised iodide solution. This work has significance for the global modelling of the dry deposition of ozone to the ocean and the subsequent emissions of iodine-containing species, thus improving the understanding of the feedback between natural halogens, air quality and climate change.</p