Factors contributing to non-initiation and incompletion of the HPV vaccine series and parental acceptability of means to improve vaccination rates

Thesis (M.A.)--Boston UniversityHuman Papillomavirus (HPV) is the most common sexually transmitted infection (STI) with approximately 79 million Americans currently infected and 14 million people becoming infected every year (CDC, 2013). About 33,300 HPV related cancers are diagnosed every year and affect more women than men (CDC, 2012). Two prophylactic HPV vaccines are currently FDA approved and recommended by the ACIP: Gardasil, a quadrivalent prophylactic vaccine for types 6, 11, 16, and 18, and Cervarix, a bivalent HPV vaccine for types 16 and 18 (ACIP, 2010). Both vaccines are recommended for girl's aged 11 or 12 years and catch-up vaccination is advised for girls between the ages of 13 and 26 (ACIP, 2010; Markowitz et al., 2007). Understanding parents' opinions about HPV vaccination is crucial to obtaining high vaccination rates and a reduced number of people affected by cervical cancer. Factors considered include physician recommendation, daughter’s age, knowledge of HPV and HPV vaccine, peer and media influence, mistrust in pharmaceutical companies, religion, race, cost, and personal experience with STIs, abnormal pap smears, or cervical cancer. Many studies have looked at factors that influence parents' acceptability and decision to vaccinate their daughters, however little is known about their opinions on methods to improve HPV vaccination and completion. [TRUNCATED

COHOMOLOGY FOR BICOMODULES. SEPARABLE AND MASCHKE FUNCTORS

Abstract. We introduce the category of bicomodules for a comonad in a Grothendieck category whose underlying functor is right exact and preserves direct sums. We characterize comonads with a separable forgetful functor by means of cohomology groups using cointegrations into bicomodules. We present two applications: the characterization of coseparable corings stated i

Inverse-designed diamond photonics

Diamond hosts optically active color centers with great promise in quantum computation, networking, and sensing. Realization of such applications is contingent upon the integration of color centers into photonic circuits. However, current diamond quantum optics experiments are restricted to single devices and few quantum emitters because fabrication constraints limit device functionalities, thus precluding color center integrated photonic circuits. In this work, we utilize inverse design methods to overcome constraints of cutting-edge diamond nanofabrication methods and fabricate compact and robust diamond devices with unique specifications. Our design method leverages advanced optimization techniques to search the full parameter space for fabricable device designs. We experimentally demonstrate inverse-designed photonic free-space interfaces as well as their scalable integration with two vastly different devices: classical photonic crystal cavities and inverse-designed waveguide-splitters. The multi-device integration capability and performance of our inverse-designed diamond platform represents a critical advancement toward integrated diamond quantum optical circuits