Eating Out in the British Isles

This paper presents a comparative analysis of the foodservice industries in both Ireland and the UK. Each industry is analysed separately using the most recently available Household Budget Survey datasets for Ireland and the most recent Expenditure and Food Datasets for the UK and is disaggregated into quick-service (fast food and takeaway) and full-service (hotel and restaurant meals), the two largest components of each industry. A double hurdle model, adjusted for misspecification, is used in this analysis. A number of variables affect both dependent variables in the same way, for example, income and age and the number of workers variable, but differences are apparent throughout the discussion. Perhaps the most interesting point to highlight is how similar the Irish and UK results for both quick-service and full-service expenditure have been despite the UK industry being at a more mature stage of growth. Health awareness significantly reduces the likelihood of participation and reduces the amount of expenditure on quick-service but no similar effect is observed for full-service in either Ireland or the UK, which in itself is significant as the UK industry is more developed than its Irish equivalent.Food-Away-From-Home, Quick-service, Full-service, Double Hurdle Model, Box-Cox Transformation., Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety, D12, D13, C34, R2.,

A double-hurdle model of Irish households' foodservice expenditure patterns

The aim of this paper is to analyse the various factors fuelling demand for Food- Away - From- Home (FAFH) in Ireland. The two largest components of this industry, the quick- service sector (fast food and takeaway) and the full- service sector (hotel and restaurant meals), are analysed using the most recently available Household Budget Survey data for Ireland. The results from a Box- Cox double hurdle model indicate that different variables affect expenditure in the different sectors in different ways. Income has a greater effect on full- service expenditure than on quick- service. Similarly households that are healthconscious indicate a greater preference for full- service meals while households with higher time values indicate a greater preference for quick- service. Households of a higher social class and those with higher education levels also appear to favour full- service expenditure. In addition, younger, urbanised households favour quick- service meal options. The results emphasise the merits of adopting a disaggregated approach to analysing foodservice expenditure patterns.Foodservice, Food- Away- From- Home, Quick- service, Fullservice, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety, D12, D13, C34, R2,

Practical Broad-Band Tuning of Dye Lasers by Solvent Shifting

We have operated a dye laser over a broad wavelength range (593.8-667.0nm) by shifting the dye emission profile with incremental changes of solvent composition. This was accomplished with the laser operating continuously, and only minor adjustment of the laser optics was required. Solvent tuning was facilitated by the critical dependence of the optimum laser wavelength on concentration of the second solvent. Using the known solvent-sensitive laser dye 9-diethylaminobenzo[a]phenoxaz-5-one (DBP), 87% of the tuning range from pure xylenes to pure methanol was covered by cumulative addition of 24 vol. % methanol to the starting xylenes solution. The optimum dye concentration was found to be independent of solvent composition, so that maximum laser power could be maintained by mixing equimolar dye solutions in the two solvents. These results establish the practicality of solvent-tuning as a method of conducting laser experiments over a broad wavelength range

Harm A. Weber academic center, post-occupancy building performance and comfort perceptions

The Weber Center at Judson University, a mixed mode, naturally ventilated building in a continental climate, has been in operation for just over a year, with initial occupancy in August 2007. This paper compares the design objectives and building performance expectations against the first year of actual energy consumption in a first of a series of post-occupancy evaluations. The paper contrasts the building performance with general user satisfaction and perceptions of comfort through a post- occupancy evaluation of user surveys and interviews. The innovations involved in this building, particularly mechanical strategies atypical in contemporary practice within this climate and region, have introduced some interesting problems that have been documented in the post-occupancy evaluation process, while confirming many of the original intentions of the design

Harm A. Weber academic center, post-occupancy building performance and comfort perceptions

The Weber Center at Judson University, a mixed mode, naturally ventilated building in a continental climate, has been in operation for just over a year, with initial occupancy in August 2007. This paper compares the design objectives and building performance expectations against the first yearof actual energy consumption in a first of a series of post-occupancy evaluations. The paper contrasts the building performance with general user satisfaction and perceptions of comfort through a post occupancy evaluation of user surveys and interviews. The innovations involved in this building, particularly mechanical strategies atypical in contemporary practice within this climate and region, have introduced some interesting problems that have been documented in the post-occupancy evaluation process, while confirming many of the original intentions of the design

Simulated annealing approach to vascular structure with application to the coronary arteries

Do the complex processes of angiogenesis during organism development ultimately lead to a near optimal coronary vasculature in the organs of adult mammals? We examine this hypothesis using a powerful and universal method, built on physical and physiological principles, for the determination of globally energetically optimal arterial trees. The method is based on simulated annealing, and can be used to examine arteries in hollow organs with arbitrary tissue geometries. We demonstrate that the approach can generate in silico vasculatures which closely match porcine anatomical data for the coronary arteries on all length scales, and that the optimized arterial trees improve systematically as computational time increases. The method presented here is general, and could in principle be used to examine the arteries of other organs. Potential applications include improvement of medical imaging analysis and the design of vascular trees for artificial organs

The cell cycle regulatory DREAM complex is disrupted by high expression of oncogenic B-Myb.

Overexpression of the oncogene MYBL2 (B-Myb) is associated with increased cell proliferation and serves as a marker of poor prognosis in cancer. However, the mechanism by which B-Myb alters the cell cycle is not fully understood. In proliferating cells, B-Myb interacts with the MuvB core complex including LIN9, LIN37, LIN52, RBBP4, and LIN54, forming the MMB (Myb-MuvB) complex, and promotes transcription of genes required for mitosis. Alternatively, the MuvB core interacts with Rb-like protein p130 and E2F4-DP1 to form the DREAM complex that mediates global repression of cell cycle genes in G0/G1, including a subset of MMB target genes. Here, we show that overexpression of B-Myb disrupts the DREAM complex in human cells, and this activity depends on the intact MuvB-binding domain in B-Myb. Furthermore, we found that B-Myb regulates the protein expression levels of the MuvB core subunit LIN52, a key adapter for assembly of both the DREAM and MMB complexes, by a mechanism that requires S28 phosphorylation site in LIN52. Given that high expression of B-Myb correlates with global loss of repression of DREAM target genes in breast and ovarian cancer, our findings offer mechanistic insights for aggressiveness of cancers with MYBL2 amplification, and establish the rationale for targeting B-Myb to restore cell cycle control

Umbilical cord blood testosterone and childhood internalizing and externalizing behavior: a prospective study

Extent: 8 p.Antenatal testosterone exposure influences fetal neurodevelopment and gender-role behavior in postnatal life and may contribute to differences in developmental psychopathology during childhood. We prospectively measured the associations between umbilical cord blood testosterone levels at birth and childhood behavioral development in both males and females from a large population based sample. The study comprised 430 females and 429 males from the Western Australian Pregnancy Cohort (Raine) Study where umbilical cord blood had been collected. Total testosterone concentrations were determined by mass spectrometry and bioavailable testosterone (BioT) levels were calculated. At two, five, eight and ten years of age, the participants completed the Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL). Linear regression models were used to analyse the relationship between BioT concentrations (in quartiles) and CBCL scores (total, internalizing, externalizing and selected syndrome). Boys had higher mean CBCL T-scores than girls across all ages of follow-up. There was no significant relationship between cord blood BioT quartiles and CBCL total, internalizing and externalizing T-scores at age two or five to ten combined. In the syndrome score analyses, higher BioT quartiles were associated with significantly lower scores for attention problems for boys at age five, eight and ten, and greater withdrawal symptoms in pre-school girls (age five). We did not identify a consistent relationship between antenatal testosterone exposure and total, internalizing or externalizing behavioral difficulties in childhood. Higher umbilical cord BioT levels were associated with lower scores for attention problems in boys up to 10 years and more withdrawn behavior in 5-year-old girls; however, these findings were not consistent across ages and require further investigation in a larger sample.Monique Robinson, Andrew J.O. Whitehouse, Peter Jacoby, Eugen Mattes, Michael G. Sawyer, Jeffrey A. Keelan and Martha Hicke

Reversible Dissociation of a Dialumene

Dialumenes are neutral Al(I) compounds with Al=Al multiple bonds. We report the isolation of an amidophosphine‐supported dialumene. Our X‐ray crystallographic, spectroscopic, and computational DFT analyses reveal a long and extreme trans‐bent Al=Al bond with a low dissociation energy and bond order. In solution, the dialumene can dissociate into monomeric Al(I) species. Reactivity studies reveal two modes of reaction: as dialumene or as aluminyl monomers

Detection of Osmotic Shock-Induced Extracellular Nucleotide Release with a Genetically Encoded Fluorescent Sensor of ADP and ATP

Purinergic signals, such as extracellular adenosine triphosphate (ATP) and adenosine diphosphate (ADP), mediate intercellular communication and stress responses throughout mammalian tissues, but the dynamics of their release and clearance are still not well understood. Although physiochemical methods provide important insight into physiology, genetically encoded optical sensors have proven particularly powerful in the quantification of signaling in live specimens. Indeed, genetically encoded luminescent and fluorescent sensors provide new insights into ATP-mediated purinergic signaling. However, new tools to detect extracellular ADP are still required. To this end, in this study, we use protein engineering to generate a new genetically encoded sensor that employs a high-affinity bacterial ADP-binding protein and reports a change in occupancy with a change in the Förster-type resonance energy transfer (FRET) between cyan and yellow fluorescent proteins. We characterize the sensor in both protein solution studies, as well as live-cell microscopy. This new sensor responds to nanomolar and micromolar concentrations of ADP and ATP in solution, respectively, and in principle it is the first fully-genetically encoded sensor with sufficiently high affinity for ADP to detect low levels of extracellular ADP. Furthermore, we demonstrate that tethering the sensor to the cell surface enables the detection of physiologically relevant nucleotide release induced by hypoosmotic shock as a model of tissue edema. Thus, we provide a new tool to study purinergic signaling that can be used across genetically tractable model systems