The 1927 Longwood Sketches of Firmin Swinnen: Replica of a Scenic Film Score

In his Longwood Sketches: Suite for Organ in Four Parts (Theodore Presser, 1927), Belgian-American organist Firmin Swinnen provides the vicarious traveler with an aural travelogue of gunpowder magnate Pierre S. du Pont's Longwood Gardens outside Kennett Square, Pennsylvania. Swinnen relays his impressions of landscapes, waterscapes, and the Lenni Lenape Indian provenance of the estate in a composition that stylistically resembles music that accompanied silent travel films of the early 1900's known as Scenics. As organist at Broadway's Rialto and Rivoli Theatres between 1916 and 1921 and Philadelphia's Aldine Theatre in 1922, Swinnen accompanied Scenics with titles like Tropical Nights (Robert C. Bruce, 1920), Lake Tahoe, Land of the Sky (Essanay, 1916), Geysers of the Yellowstone (Paramount, 1917), and Trails that Lure (U.S. Department of Agriculture, 1920). These films have been archived and preserved to allow for viewing by modern-day audiences. Absent from the films, however, is the sound of musical accompaniment which, during the silent era, was provided either by an orchestra or organist who through-played one or two composed orchestral compositions or by an organist who improvised an accompaniment that was informed by changing scenery on the screen. By referring to period film music columns like Montville Morris Hansford's "Preparing Music for Photoplay Accompaniments" (New York Dramatic Mirror) and George W. Beynon's "Music for the Picture" (Moving Picture World), where documentation can be found that indicates which orchestral selections were paired with given Scenics, it is possible for contemporary musicians to replicate authentic orchestral accompaniments. However, the organ improvisations that accompanied Scenics have been lost to time, making it impossible to recreate the exact aural experience for the 20th-century movie-goer. Longwood Sketches is an important connection to the unwritten practices of the silent film period and can provide contemporary organists with authentic material with which to design Scenic scores. The purpose of this paper is to show that, with its illustrative nature titles, program notes that show Swinnen's intent to portray specific Scenic subjects, and musical language that depicts these subjects using tropes common to cinema, Longwood Sketches replicates a Scenic film score. In the first chapter, sacred, pastoral, avian, and atmospheric subjects are identified in Longwood Sketches and a comparison is made between Swinnen's representations of these topics in the composition to his representations of comparable topics in his 1926 recording of a "Storm" improvisation. The second chapter contains a comparison between Swinnen's representations of Native American, water, faunal and floral topics in the composition and music recommended for use by organists when accompanying scenes with comparable topics in cinema as found in period anthologies like Ernö Rapée's Motion Picture Moods for Pianists and Organists (1924) and Sam Fox Moving Picture Music (1913-1914). The third chapter shows that Swinnen uses compositional devices such as motif, rhetorical pause and characteristic key associations in a like manner to the recommendations made in authoritative manuals such as Edith Lang and George West's Musical Accompaniment of Moving Pictures (1920) and George Beynon's Musical Presentation of Motion Pictures (1921). The paper ends with an examination of audience and critical reception of Longwood Sketches to determine if those in attendance at the initial performances of the work, who were movie-goers accustomed to receiving visual codes in moving pictures to guide narrative, were able to identify Swinnen's intended themes by aural cues alone

Accurate Coordinates and 2MASS Cross-IDs for (Almost) All Gliese Catalog Stars

We provide precise J2000, epoch 2000 coordinates and cross-identifications to sources in the 2MASS point source catalog for nearly all stars in the Gliese, Gliese and Jahreiss, and Woolley catalogs of nearby stars. The only Gliese objects where we were not successful are two Gliese sources that are actually QSOs, two proposed companions to brighter stars which we believe do not exist, four stars included in one of the catalogs but identified there as only optical companions, one probable plate flaw, and two stars which simply remain un-recovered. For the 4251 recovered stars, 2693 have coordinates based on Hipparcos positions, 1549 have coordinates based on 2MASS data, and 9 have positions from other astrometric sources. All positions have been calculated at epoch 2000 using proper motions from the literature, which are also given here.Comment: accepted to PASP, Full version of Table 1 available electronicall

Addressing the Ethical, Legal, and Social Issues Raised by Voting by Persons with Dementia

This article addresses an emerging policy problem in the United States participation in the electoral process by citizens with dementia. At present, health care professionals, family caregivers, and long-term care staff lack adequate guidance to decide whether individuals with dementia should be precluded from or assisted in casting a ballot. Voting by persons with dementia raises a series of important questions about the autonomy of individuals with dementia, the integrity of the electoral process, and the prevention of fraud. Three subsidiary issues warrant special attention: development of a method to assess capacity to vote; identification of appropriate kinds of assistance to enable persons with cognitive impairment to vote; and formulation of uniform and workable policies for voting in long-term care settings. In some instances, extrapolation from existing policies and research permits reasonable recommendations to guide policy and practice. However, in other instances, additional research is necessary

COMT genetic variation confers risk for psychotic and affective disorders: a case control study

BACKGROUND: Variation in the COMT gene has been implicated in a number of psychiatric disorders, including psychotic, affective and anxiety disorders. The majority of these studies have focused on the functional Val108/158Met polymorphism and yielded conflicting results, with limited studies examining the relationship between other polymorphisms, or haplotypes, and psychiatric illness. We hypothesized that COMT variation may confer a general risk for psychiatric disorders and have genotyped four COMT variants (Val158Met, rs737865, rs165599, and a SNP in the P2 promoter [-278A/G; rs2097603]) in 394 Caucasian cases and 467 controls. Cases included patients with schizophrenia (n = 196), schizoaffective disorder (n = 62), bipolar disorder (n = 82), major depression (n = 30), and patients diagnosed with either psychotic disorder NOS or depressive disorder NOS (n = 24). RESULTS: SNP rs2097603, the Val/Met variant and SNP rs165599 were significantly associated (p = 0.004; p = 0.05; p = 0.035) with a broad "all affected" diagnosis. Haplotype analysis revealed a potentially protective G-A-A-A haplotype haplotype (-278A/G; rs737865; Val108/158Met; rs165599), which was significantly underrepresented in this group (p = 0.0033) and contained the opposite alleles of the risk haplotype previously described by Shifman et al. Analysis of diagnostic subgroups within the "all affecteds group" showed an association of COMT in patients with psychotic disorders as well as in cases with affective illness although the associated variants differed. The protective haplotype remained significantly underrepresented in most of these subgroups. CONCLUSION: Our results support the view that COMT variation provides a weak general predisposition to neuropsychiatric disease including psychotic and affective disorders

TERMS Photometry of Known Transiting Exoplanets

The Transit Ephemeris Refinement and Monitoring Survey (TERMS) conducts radial velocity and photometric monitoring of known exoplanets in order to refine planetary orbits and predictions of possible transit times. This effort is primarily directed towards planets not known to transit, but a small sample of our targets consist of known transiting systems. Here we present precision photometry for 6 WASP planets acquired during their transit windows. We perform a Markov Chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) analysis for each planet and combine these data with previous measurements to redetermine the period and ephemerides for these planets. These observations provide recent mid-transit times which are useful for scheduling future observations. Our results improve the ephemerides of WASP-4b, WASP-5b and WASP-6b and reduce the uncertainties on the mid-transit time for WASP-29b. We also confirm the orbital, stellar and planetary parameters of all 6 systems.Comment: 12 pages; 6 figures; 9 tables; accepted for publication in AJ; two references updated and minor improvements made to match the version to be publishe

Assessment of bone marrow-derived Cellular Therapy in progressive Multiple Sclerosis (ACTiMuS):study protocol for a randomised controlled trial

BACKGROUND: We have recently completed an evaluation of the safety and feasibility of intravenous delivery of autologous bone marrow in patients with progressive multiple sclerosis (MS). The possibility of repair was suggested by improvement in the neurophysiological secondary outcome measure seen in all participants. The current study will examine the efficacy of intravenous delivery of autologous marrow in progressive MS. Laboratory studies performed in parallel with the clinical trial will further investigate the biology of bone marrow-derived stem cell infusion in MS, including mechanisms underlying repair. METHODS/DESIGN: A prospective, randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled, stepped wedge design will be employed at a single centre (Bristol, UK). Eighty patients with progressive MS will be recruited; 60 will have secondary progressive disease (SPMS) but a subset (n = 20) will have primary progressive disease (PPMS). Participants will be randomised to either early or late (1 year) intravenous infusion of autologous, unfractionated bone marrow. The placebo intervention is infusion of autologous blood. The primary outcome measure is global evoked potential derived from multimodal evoked potentials. Secondary outcome measures include adverse event reporting, clinical (EDSS and MSFC) and self-assessment (MSIS-29) rating scales, optical coherence tomography (OCT) as well as brain and spine MRI. Participants will be followed up for a further year following the final intervention. Outcomes will be analysed on an intention-to-treat basis. DISCUSSION: Assessment of bone marrow-derived Cellular Therapy in progressive Multiple Sclerosis (ACTiMuS) is the first randomised, placebo-controlled trial of non-myeloablative autologous bone marrow-derived stem cell therapy in MS. It will determine whether bone marrow cell therapy can, as was suggested by the phase I safety study, improve conduction in multiple central nervous system pathways affected in progressive MS. Furthermore, laboratory studies performed in parallel with the clinical trial will inform our understanding of the cellular pharmacodynamics of bone marrow infusion in MS patients and the mechanisms underlying cell therapy. TRIAL REGISTRATION: ISRCTN27232902 Registration date 11/09/2012. NCT01815632 Registration date 19/03/201

Getting under the skin: children's health disparities as embodiment of social class

Social class gradients in children’s health and development are ubiquitous across time and geography. The authors develop a conceptual framework relating three actions of class—material allocation, salient group identity, and inter-group conflict—to the reproduction of class-based disparities in child health. A core proposition is that the actions of class stratification create variation in children’s mesosystems and microsystems in distinct locations in the ecology of everyday life. Variation in mesosystems (e.g., health care, neighborhoods) and microsystems (e.g., family structure, housing) become manifest in a wide variety of specific experiences and environments that produce the behavioral and biological antecedents to health and disease among children. The framework is explored via a review of theoretical and empirical contributions from multiple disciplines and high-priority areas for future research are highlighted

First-in-Human Gene Therapy Trial of AAV8-hCARp.hCNGB3 in Adults and Children With CNGB3-associated Achromatopsia

PURPOSE: To assess the safety and efficacy of AAV8-hCARp.hCNGB3 in participants with CNGB3-associated achromatopsia (ACHM). DESIGN: Prospective, phase 1/2 (NCT03001310), open-label, nonrandomized clinical trial. METHODS: The study enrolled 23 adults and children with CNGB3-associated ACHM. In the dose-escalation phase, adult participants were administered 1 of 3 AAV8-hCARp.hCNGB3 dose levels in the worse-seeing eye (up to 0.5 mL). After a maximum tolerated dose was established in adults, an expansion phase was conducted in children ≥3 years old. All participants received topical and oral corticosteroids. Safety and efficacy parameters, including treatment-related adverse events and visual acuity, retinal sensitivity, color vision, and light sensitivity, were assessed for 6 months. RESULTS: AAV8-hCARp.hCNGB3 (11 adults, 12 children) was safe and generally well tolerated. Intraocular inflammation occurred in 9 of 23 participants and was mainly mild or moderate in severity. Severe cases occurred primarily at the highest dose. Two events were considered serious and dose limiting. All intraocular inflammation resolved following topical and systemic steroids. There was no consistent pattern of change from baseline to week 24 for any efficacy assessment. However, favorable changes were observed for individual participants across several assessments, including color vision (n = 6/23), photoaversion (n = 11/20), and vision-related quality-of-life questionnaires (n = 21/23). CONCLUSIONS: AAV8-hCARp.hCNGB3 for CNGB3-associated ACHM demonstrated an acceptable safety and tolerability profile. Improvements in several efficacy parameters indicate that AAV8-hCARp.hCNGB3 gene therapy may provide benefit. These findings, with the development of additional sensitive and quantitative end points, support continued investigation