Final Report of the Evaluation of the San Mateo County Children's Health Initiative

Summarizes key findings from a five-year evaluation of the county's Children's Health Initiative -- its outreach and enrollment efforts, the impact on children enrolled in the Healthy Kids program, areas for improvement, and financing challenges

Next Generation Diapers: Increasing Elastic Laminate Toughness

Disposable diapers are prone to accidental damage during use, since a caregiver may accidentally rip or puncture the elastic material. To reduce the incidence of material failure, the toughness of the apertured elastic trilaminate body paneling material needs to be improved without reducing the elasticity, breathability, and material cost. A “tougher” material was defined as a material with greater tensile strength and puncture resistance than standard, commercial product. The design team took a two-pronged approach to this problem. First, experiments were designed to quantify the effects of altering the die temperature, the resin blend, the cross directional stretch activation depth, and production line speed on toughness. A 2-level, full factorial analysis revealed that the process variables that had the largest effect were activation depth and die temperature. While altering the resin blend improved toughness, the trilaminate elasticity suffered. Decreasing both activation depth and die temperature resulted in a 19.7% greater puncture resistance than the original material, which was able to withstand 17.5% greater tensile load. However, only a minimal increase in its elongation at break, 5.7%, was achieved. Decreasing only activation depth provided a better balance of the desired characteristics: an 11.5% increase in puncture resistance, 16.1% increase in tensile load, and 14.6% increase in elongation. The experimental data collected was used to supplement a finite element analysis model of altered aperture orientation. This showed that rotating the oval aperture by 90° reduced the maximum stress by 62.3%. These findings will pave the way for further elastic laminate material improvements.https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/capstone/1143/thumbnail.jp

Evaluation of Neurobehavioral Abnormalities and Immunotoxicity after Oral Imidacloprid Exposure in Domestic Chickens (Gallus gallus domesticus)

University of Minnesota M.S. thesis. May 2019. Major: Veterinary Medicine. Advisor: Julia Ponder. 1 computer file (PDF); v, 57 pages.Neonicotinoid pesticides may have negative effects on non-target species at environmentally plausible exposure doses. The objective of the present study was to quantify neurobehavioral abnormalities and immunotoxicity due to oral imidacloprid exposure in birds. Domestic white leghorn chickens (Gallus gallus domesticus; n=120) were exposed to imidacloprid by gavage once daily for 7 consecutive days at 0, 0.03, 0.34, 3.42, 10.25, and 15.50 mg/kg. The severity and duration of neurobehavioral abnormalities were recorded, and immune function was assessed with 7 standard functional assays. Immunotoxicity was not detected. Temporary neurobehavioral abnormalities were observed in a dose-dependent manner, including generalized whole-body muscle tremors, ataxia, and depressed mentation ranging from mild depression to a complete lack of response to external stimulation. The effect dose value for the presence of any neurobehavioral abnormalities in 50% of the test group (ED50) was 4.63 mg/kg/day. The ED50 for an adjusted score that included both the severity and duration of neurobehavioral abnormalities was 11.27 mg/kg/day. The no observed adverse effect level (NOAEL) and lowest observed effect level (LOEL) were 3.42 mg/kg/day, and the lowest observed adverse effect level (LOAEL) was 10.25 mg/kg/day. While immunotoxicity was not demonstrated in the present study, it cannot be ruled out. The observed neurobehavioral abnormalities were severe at the higher doses and may impair survival of free-living gallinaceous birds

Decades of Delay: EPA Leadership Still Lacking in Protecting America's Great River

This report demonstrates the continuing failure of EPA's voluntary approach and the continuing and growing threats of unregulated nitrogen and phosphorus pollution. EPA has the power and the duty to act to require reasonable, common-sense regulations to address the growing scourge of nutrient pollution, and it should do so. Once again, MRC calls upon EPA to remedy this state of affairs, specifically recommending that EPA:Develop numeric phosphorus criteria for each of the eight states that have yet to adopt them, and numeric nitrogen criteria for all 10 states.Require states to assess their waters for nitrogen and phosphorus pollution and to prioritize TMDL development and implementation planning accordingly.Increase oversight of the state NPDES programs to ensure that both narrative and numeric nutrient criteria are implemented through limits in permits, including the use of Water Quality Based Effluent Limits (WQBELs) where appropriate.Disapprove TMDLs that lacking reasonable assurance that nonpoint source reductions are likely to occur and lack monitoring and timelines to ensure that planned reductions actually take place. Further, EPA needs to provide oversight to ensure consistency among EPA Regions in TMDL review and approval (especially in Regions 4 and 6.)Ensure that states' Nutrient Reduction Strategies contain implementation plans detailing point and nonpoint source reductions needed, responsible parties, funding mechanisms, milestones, measurement metrics, and reasonable timelines.Require states under Section 319 of the Clean Water Act to identify programs and practices for controlling nonpoint sources of pollution to the maximum extent possible

Cross-Boarder Teaching and Collaboration

Since the publication of Best Practices for Legal Education, the globalization of both legal education and law practice has exploded. Today’s lawyers increasingly serve border-crossing clients or clients who present with transnational legal issues. As law schools expand their international programs, and enroll increasing numbers of non-U.S. law students, law students transcend cultural and legal borders. As a result, they deepen their understanding of—and sharpen their critical perspective on—their own national systems. Similarly, U.S. law teachers are increasingly called to engage in border-crossing teaching and other academic pursuits. Best Practices did not address these issues. The primary aim of this chapter of Building on Best Practices: Transforming Legal Education in a Changing World (Lexis 2015) is to identify best practices for law teachers engaged with non-U.S. or “international” learners who study or train in a U.S.-style learning environment, either in the United States or abroad. This chapter also addresses collaboration of U.S. law teachers with their counterparts abroad in such areas as developing innovative teaching and clinical legal education, training and research. It identifies eight guiding principles that cut across types of international learning and then applies these principles to three specific contexts: 1) teaching international students in U.S. law school settings; 2) integrating international students in U.S.-based clinics; and 3) collaborating in legal education and reform efforts with law teachers abroad.https://digitalcommons.law.uw.edu/faculty-chapters/1001/thumbnail.jp

Evidence for downflows in the narrow plasma sheet of 2017 September 10 and their significance for flare reconnection

This work was supported partly by a grant from NASA's Heliophysics Supporting Research (HSR) program and partly by a grant from NSF/AGS's Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU) program.Current sheets are believed to form in the wakes of erupting flux ropes and to enable the magnetic reconnection responsible for an associated flare. Multiwavelength observations of an eruption on 2017 September 10 show a long, linear feature widely taken as evidence of a current sheet viewed edge-on. The relation between the high-temperature, high-density plasma thus observed and any current sheet is not yet entirely clear. We estimate the magnetic field strength surrounding the sheet and conclude that approximately one-third of all flux in the active region was opened by the eruption. Subsequently decreasing field strength suggests that the open flux closed down over the next several hours through reconnection at a rate Mx s−1. We find in AIA observations evidence of downward-moving, dark structures analogous to either supra-arcade downflows, more typically observed above flare arcades viewed face-on, or supra-arcade downflowing loops, previously reported in flares viewed in this perspective. These features suggest that the plasma sheet is composed of the magnetic flux retracting after being reconnected high above the arcade. We model flux tube retraction following reconnection to show that this process can generate high densities and temperatures as observed in the plasma sheet. The retracting flux tubes reach their highest temperatures at the end of their retraction, well below the site of reconnection, consistent with previous analysis of AIA and EIS data showing a peak in the plasma temperature near the base of this particular sheet.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

Using Revenue Sharing to Implement Flexible Prices: Evidence from Movie Exhibition Contracts

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/92049/1/joie483.pd