The History, Development and Impact of Computed Imaging in Neurological Diagnosis and Neurosurgery: CT, MRI, and DTI

A steady series of advances in physics, mathematics, computers and clinical imaging science have progressively transformed diagnosis and treatment of neurological and neurosurgical disorders in the 115 years between the discovery of the X-ray and the advent of high resolution diffusion based functional MRI. The story of the progress in human terms, with its battles for priorities, forgotten advances, competing claims, public battles for Nobel Prizes, and patent priority litigations bring alive the human drama of this remarkable collective achievement in computed medical imaging

Metrics for Aggregating the Climate Effect of Different Emissions: A Unifying Framework. ESRI WP257, September 2008

Multi-gas approaches to climate change policies require a metric establishing “equivalences” among emissions of various species. Climate scientists and economists have proposed four classes of such metrics and debated their relative merits. We present a unifying framework that clarifies the relationships among them. We show that the Global Warming Potential, used in international law to compare greenhouse gases, is a special case of the Global Damage Potential, assuming (1) a finite time horizon, (2) a zero discount rate, (3) constant atmospheric concentrations, and (4) impacts that are proportional to radiactive forcing. We show that the Global Temperature change Potential is a special case of the Global Cost Potential, assuming (1) no induced technological change, and (2) a short-lived capital stock. We also show that the Global Cost Potential is a special case of the Global Damage Potential, assuming (1) zero damages below a threshold and (2) infinite damage after a threshold. The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change uses the Global Warming Potential, a simplified cost-benefit concept, even though the UNFCCC frames climate policy as a cost-effectiveness problem and should therefore use the Global Cost Potential or its simplification, the Global Temperature Potential

Metrics for aggregating the climate effect of different emissions: A unifying framework

Multi-gas approaches to climate change policies require a metric establishing equivalences among emissions of various species. Climate scientists and economists have proposed four classes of such metrics and debated their relative merits. We present a unifying framework that clarifies the relationships among them. We show that the Global Warming Potential, used in international law to compare greenhouse gases, is a special case of the Global Damage Potential, assuming (1) a finite time horizon, (2) a zero discount rate, (3) constant atmospheric concentrations, and (4) impacts that are proportional to radiative forcing. We show that the Global Temperature change Potential is a special case of the Global Cost Potential, assuming (1) no induced technological change, and (2) a short-lived capital stock. We also show that the Global Cost Potential is a special case of the Global Damage Potential, assuming (1) zero damages below a threshold and (2) infinite damage after a threshold. The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change uses the Global Warming Potential, a simplified cost-benefit concept, even though the UNFCCC frames climate policy as a cost-effectiveness problem and should therefore use the Global Cost Potential or its simplification, the Global Temperature Potential

Surfactants for heterogeneous processes in liquid or supercritical CO.sub.2

Heterogeneous polymer mixtures comprising a polymer in liquid or supercritical CO.sub.2 are stabilized by employing a poly(propylene oxide) or poly(butylene oxide) based surfactant. These surfactants are especially well suited for stabilizing heterogeneous polymer mixtures formed by micronizing techniques as well as by precipitation of a compressed fluid antisolvent applications.Board of Regents, University of Texas Syste

Quantifying the resuspension of nutrients and sediment by demersal trawling

Demersal fisheries trawling is widely acknowledged as one of the most intense forms of widespread benthic disturbance, resuspending extensive plumes of sediments and dissolved nutrients. However, difficulties associated with sampling within trawl plumes have hitherto limited our quantitative understanding of these widespread phenomena. This lack of knowledge hinders our ability to understand the broader consequences of demersal trawling and the development of new fishing gears to limit benthic disturbance. Here we present data from a series of novel in situ experiments using a specially designed trawl sled to quantitatively examine how trawl gear-induced drag and pressure influence the height and concentrations of resuspended sediments and nutrients within a trawl plume. Our data demonstrate that the composition of resuspended particles and sampled nutrients are both influenced by sampling height above the seafloor and the amount of drag exerted by the trawl gear (p < 0.001 in all cases), although the relative importance of these factors differed between the response variables examined. These differences likely reflect that sediment particles are more influenced by gravity than dissolved nutrients are. Our results demonstrate that trawl gear specification strongly influences the amount of dissolved and particulate material resuspended, suggesting that their design could be modified to reduce impacts on benthic ecosystems

An alternative strategy for trypanosome survival in the mammalian bloodstream revealed through genome and transcriptome analysis of the ubiquitous bovine parasite Trypanosoma (Megatrypanum) theileri

There are hundreds of Trypanosoma species that live in the blood and tissue spaces of their vertebrate hosts. The vast majority of these do not have the ornate system of antigenic variation that has evolved in the small number of African trypanosome species, but can still maintain long term infections in the face of the vertebrate adaptive immune system. Trypanosoma theileri is a typical example, it has a restricted host range of cattle and other Bovinae and is only occasionally reported to cause patent disease although no systematic survey of the effect of infection on agricultural productivity has been performed. Here, a detailed genome sequence and a transcriptome analysis of gene expression in bloodstream form T. theileri have been performed. Analysis of the genome sequence and expression showed that T. theileri has a typical kinetoplastid genome structure and allowed a prediction that it is capable of meiotic exchange, gene silencing via RNA interference and, potentially, density-dependent growth control. In particular, the transcriptome analysis has allowed a comparison of two distinct trypanosome cell surfaces, T. brucei and T. theileri, that have each evolved to enable the maintenance of a long-term extracellular infection in cattle. The T. theileri cell surface can be modelled to contain a mixture of proteins encoded by four novel large and divergent gene families and by members of a major surface protease gene family. This surface composition is distinct from the uniform variant surface glycoprotein coat on African trypanosomes providing an insight into a second mechanism used by trypanosome species that proliferate in an extracellular milieu in vertebrate hosts to avoid the adaptive immune response

The end of the beginning? Taking forward local democratic renewal in the post-referendum North East.

This article draws upon the author’s commissioned research on the nature of regional governance following the 2004 Referendum in the North East on elected regional assemblies. The article aimed to both capture these views and to assess how the ‘No vote in the referendum has impacted on subsequent developments in sub-national governance. The article provides both an empirical overview of recent developments and engages with the wider conceptual debates on democratic renewal. The arguments covered in this output are aimed at both academic and practitioner audiences, and have been also disseminated at regional and national conferences