Ciprofloxacin and Compulsory Licensing of Pharmaceutical Patents

The recent threat of biological terrorism involving the Anthrax virus incited a debate about whether the United States government should use its powers under 28 USC §1498 to take a compulsory license on the drug ciprofloxacin in order to stockpile it. Negotiating a deal with Bayer allowed the United States to stockpile ciprofloxacin at a substantial discount while avoiding the negative consequences of issuing a compulsory license. Under 35 U.S.C. 1498, the United States government has the authority to issue a compulsory license; however, the government may not have the authority under the TRIPs agreement. In fact, under the interpretation of the TRIPs agreement that the United States has adopted in previous situations when other countries wanted to issue compulsory licenses on pharmaceuticals, the United States most likely would have violated TRIPs if it had issued a compulsory license for ciprofloxacin. Furthermore, the policy decision to have strong patent protection and to not have price controls on pharmaceuticals in the United States has led to the development of a very strong pharmaceutical industry that leads the world in the development of innovative drugs

The Art of Inclusion: Marketing Toward Social Good

The theme of this research emerges from a pedagogical philosophy that it is essential to learn the significance that business has upon society while working with a neighborhood non-profit. Undergraduate Business students from Molloy College pitch their business and marketing recommendations to a local non-profit supporting the mission of the College through transformative learning. Having students enter into the business world where profit is a healthy by-product, but acquiring the proper disposition in the process is critical toward today’s career development. The Capstone project helps develop tomorrow’s sought out ethical and social leaders. The learning activity leading to this learning outcome requires the undergraduate business students to experience this type of real-world project. The students are presented with an opportunity to study the most prevalent issues their assigned non-profit is facing and they are to collectively make a set of turnkey recommendations that will ultimately lead to social good

A Systematic Review of International Clinical Guidelines for Rehabilitation of People With Neurological Conditions: What Recommendations Are Made for Upper Limb Assessment?

Conclusions: We present a comprehensive, critical, and original summary of current recommendations. Defining a core set of measures and agreed protocols requires international consensus between experts representing the diverse and multi-disciplinary field of neurorehabilitation including clinical researchers and practitioners, rehabilitation technology researchers, and commercial developers. Current lack of guidance may hold-back progress in understanding function and recovery. Together with a Delphi consensus study and an overview of systematic reviews of outcome measures it will contribute to the development of international guidelines for upper limb assessment in neurological conditions.This review formed part of the COST Action TD 1006A European Network on Robotics for Neurorehabilitation. It was an interdisciplinary EU-funded research network concentrating on the coordination of European research in the area of rehabilitation robotics

Distribution and Prevalence of Wolbachia Infections in Native Populations of the Fire Ant Solenopsis invicta (Hymenoptera: Formicidae)

Wolbachia are endosymbiotic bacteria that commonly infect arthropods. These bacteria induce a number of phenotypes in their hosts, including cytoplasmic incompatibility, thelytokous parthenogenesis, feminization, and male killing. We surveyed native South American populations of the fire ant Solenopsis invicta Buren for Wolbachia infections by using a diagnostic polymerase chain reaction assay. In addition, we determined the fidelity of vertical transmission of the bacteria from mother to offspring in this species by assaying daughters in 24 simple-family (monogyne) colonies. Infections were common in many parts of the extensive native range of S. invicta. However, the proportion of individuals infected varied greatly among samples, ranging from zero in several populations from the northerly parts of the range to >90% in more southerly populations. Possible explanations for this variation in the prevalence of Wolbachia infections are discussed. A survey of the two social forms of S. invicta from four geographic areas showed that the prevalence of Wolbachia infections consistently was higher in the monogyne form (single queen per colony) than the sympatric polygyne form (multiple queens per colony). One likely explanation for this trend is that the selective regimes acting on Wolbachia in the two forms differ because of the dissimilar reproductive strategies used by each form. Finally, overall transmission efficiency was found to be very high (>99%), making it unlikely that imperfect transmission prevents the spread of the microbe to near fixation in native population

Finite-time Singularity Formation for Strong Solutions to the 3D3D Euler Equations, I

In this paper and the companion paper [EJE2], we establish finite-time singularity formation for finite-energy strong solutions to the axi-symmetric $3D$ Euler equations in the domain $\{(x,y,z)\in\mathbb{R}^3:z^2\leq c(x^2+y^2)\}$ for some $c>0$. In the spirit of our previous works, [EJSI] and [EJB], we do this by first studying scale-invariant solutions which satisfy a one dimensional PDE system and proving that they may become singular in finite time for properly chosen initial data. We then prove local well-posedness for the $3D$ Euler equations in a natural regularity class which includes scale-invariant solutions. While these solutions have uniformly bounded vorticity from time zero until right before the blow-up time, they do not have finite energy. To remedy this, we cut off the scale-invariant data to ensure finite energy and prove that the corresponding local solution must also become singular in finite time. This paper focuses only on the analysis of the scale-invariant solutions themselves and the proof that they can become singular in finite time. The local well-posedness theorem and the cut-off argument are very close to those in [JSI] and [EJB] and are left for the companion paper [EJE2]. It is important to remark that while the fluid domain is the exterior of a cone, we prove global regularity for the axi-symmetric $3D$ Euler equations without swirl in the exact same regularity classes and in the same domain. It is quite possible that the methods we use can be adapted to establish finite-time singularity formation for $C^\infty$ finite-energy solutions to the $3D$ Euler equations on $\mathbb{R}^3_+$.Comment: There was a sign error in the version of the axi-symmetric Euler equations that we have adopted. While Theorems A and D remain valid as stated, it is unclear whether finite-time singularity formation results hold for the systems with correct sign

Gender Differences in Stress and Coping Among Adults Living in Hawai`i

Background and purpose. Stress has been recognized as a public health problem. However, little research has been done on gender differences in sources of stress and coping strategies in Hawaii. In this study, we hypothesized that: 1) women will report higher levels of stress than men; 2) women will report being stressed by family and health related stressors while men will report stress related to finances and work-related issues; 3) women will report using adaptive coping strategies more frequently while men will report using maladaptive and avoidance strategies more frequently; 4) there will be no gender differences in the readiness to use stress management strategies. Method. A statewide cross-sectional telephone-survey of 1518 participants was conducted during the spring and summer of 2006. Results. Women reported higher overall perceived stress levels, but there was no difference in the experienced social stressors and health stressors between genders. Men perceived more stress from personal factors. There were no gender differences in the perceived ability to cope with stress. However, women were more likely to use adaptive coping strategies, whereas men were more likely to use maladaptive and avoidance coping strategies. There were no significant gender differences in stages of change for stress management. Conclusion. Based on this study, interventions can be developed to help people better cope with stress. Interventions for women may focus on increasing the use of adaptive strategies such as praying and talking to friends and family, while interventions for men may introduce the use of adaptive coping strategies such as exercise and actively fighting causes of stress. This study shows that gender differences in stress levels and coping in Hawaii are similar to previous studies conducted on the mainland. More research into specific stressors and coping strategies may help tailor interventions that are more effective and comprehensive

How much noise is too much? Methods for identifying thresholds for soundscape quality and ecosystem services

The United States National Park Service mandate is to conserve park resources and provide superlative visitor experience. In the context of acoustic resources, Denali National Park and Preserve provides an advantageous opportunity to understand the effect of aircraft noise on visitor experience because it possesses high levels of air tour traffic in a park renowned for its remote, wilderness character. Park visitors in four different settings were asked to rate the acceptability of recordings of aircraft noise, presented in randomized order relative to noise level. A cumulative link mixed model fitted visitor assessments to acoustic and nonacoustic factors. In addition to noise level, interest in an air tour was an important predictor of sound clip acceptability. For visitors uninterested in an air tour, the probability of rating aircraft noise as unacceptable at 54 dB LAeq,30 s or higher was 26%. For reference, this aligns with federal guidance that identified 55 dB as a threshold for interference with outdoor activities at rural residences and schools. Predictions of visitor response were joined to a spatial model of aircraft noise propagation to map visitor acceptability of aircraft noise in Denali’s entrance area (frontcountry). This map can be used to assess the condition of park management zones, to inform hiking recommendations for visitors, and to predict the range of soundscape conditions experienced by park visitors Soundscapes Threshold Indicators Aircraft noise Spatial analysis Ecosystem servicespublishedVersio

Causal role of motor simulation in turn-taking behavior

© 2015 the authors. Overlap between sensory and motor representations has been documented for a range of human actions, from grasping (Rizzolatti et al., 1996b) to playing a musical instrument (Novembre and Keller, 2014). Such overlap suggests that individuals use motor simulation to predict the outcome of observed actions (Wolpert, 1997). Here we investigate motor simulation as a basis of human communication. Using a musical turn-taking task, we show that pianists call on motor representations of their partner’s part to predict when to come in for their own turn. Pianists played alternating solos with a videoed partner, and double-pulse transcranial magnetic stimulation was applied around the turn-switch to temporarily disrupt processing in two cortical regions implicated previously in different forms of motor simulation: (1) the dorsal premotor cortex (dPMC), associated with automatic motor resonance during passive observation of hand actions, especially when the actions are familiar (Lahav et al., 2007); and (2) the supplementary motor area (SMA), involved in active motor imagery, especially when the actions are familiar (Baumann et al., 2007). Stimulation of the right dPMC decreased the temporal accuracy of pianists’ (right-hand) entries relative to sham when the partner’s (left-hand) part had been rehearsed previously. This effect did not occur for dPMC stimulation without rehearsal or for SMA stimulation. These findings support the role of the dPMC in predicting the time course of observed actions via resonance-based motor simulation during turn-taking. Because turn-taking spans multiple modes of human interaction, we suggest that simulation is a foundational mechanism underlying the temporal dynamics of joint action