In Brief: the National Retail Planning Forum Briefing Paper Series

The National Retail Planning Forum (NRPF) was established in 1995. The NRPF combines a focus for improving understanding between private and public sectors on planning and its impact on retailing, together with a strong research programme. A membership based organisation, the NRPF is specifically not a lobbying organisation. Drawing as it does on local and central government, the private sector and the academic arena, it aims to act as a bridge between the different interests involved in retail planning. From the outset, the goal of the NRPF has been to identify, understand and improve the knowledge about retail planning. Key components of this approach have been undertaken by the Institute for Retail Studies (IRS) at the University of Stirling on behalf of the NRPF. There is an established bibliography, updated annually, and now incorporated into the Retail Planning Knowledge Base. Associated with this is the regularly updated Planner’s Bookshelf. In 2006 it was decided by IRS and the NRPF that a Briefing Papers Series could enhance the mission of the NRPF and focus attention on the evidence base in a changing retail scene. This short paper introduces this Retail Briefing Paper series. The series is intended to be a highly accessible web based source, informing users of current issues and drawing on the accumulated research expertise and evidence base. Together the series helps deliver the belief of the National Retail Planning Forum that policy should be firmly based on evidence and expertise. This paper first considers the recent developments in the UK retail planning debate. The changing environment acts as a context for the Retail Briefing Paper series and to some extent drives the selection of topics. Secondly the Retail Briefing Papers available are reviewed and details of access etc. are provided. Finally some thoughts for the future are presented

Central exclusive chi (c) meson production at the Tevatron revisited

Motivated by the recent experimental observation of exclusive c events at the Tevatron, we revisit earlier studies of central exclusive scalar c0 meson production, before generalising the existing formalism to include c1 and c2 mesons. Although c0 production was previously assumed to be dominant, we find that the c1 and c2 rates for the experimentally considered c ! J/ ! μ+μ− decay process are in fact comparable to the c0 rate. We have developed a new Monte Carlo event generator, SuperCHIC, which models the central exclusive production of the three c states via this decay chain, and have explored possible ways of distinguishing them, given that their mass differences are not resolvable within the current experimental set-up. Although we find that the severity of current experimental cuts appears to preclude this, the acceptance does not change crucially between the three states and so our conclusions regarding the overall rates remain unchanged. This therefore raises the interesting possibility that exclusive c1 and c2 production has already been observed at the Tevatron

A relativistic jet from Cygnus X-1 in the low/hard X-ray state

We present the detection of a radio-emitting jet from the black-hole candidate and X-ray binary source Cygnus X-1. Evidence of a bright core with a slightly extended structure was found on milliarcsecond resolution observations with the VLBA at 15.4 GHz. Later observations with the VLBA (and including the phased up VLA) at 8.4 GHz show an extended jet-like feature extending to approx. 15 mas from a core region, with an opening angle of < 2 degrees. In addition, lower resolution MERLIN observations at 5 GHz show that the source has < 10 per cent linear polarization. The source was in the low/hard X-ray state during the observations, and the results confirm the existence of persistent radio emission from an unresolved core and a variable relativistic (> 0.6c) jet during this state.Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRA

Subtidal macrozoobenthos communities from northern Chile during and post El Niño 1997–1998

Despite a large amount of climatic and oceanographic information dealing with the recurring climate phenomenon El Niño (EN) and its well known impact on diversity of marine benthic communities, most published data are rather descriptive and consequently our understanding of the underlying mechanisms and processes that drive community structure during EN are still very scarce. In this study, we address two questions on the effects of EN on macrozoobenthic communities: (1) how does EN affect species diversity of the communities in northern Chile? and (2) is EN a phenomenon that restarts community assembling processes by affecting species interactions in northern Chile? To answer these questions, we compared species diversity and co-occurrence patterns of soft-bottoms macrozoobenthos communities from the continental shelf off northern Chile during (March 1998) and after (September 1998) the strong EN event 1997–1998. The methods used varied from species diversity and species co-occurrence analyses to multivariate ordination methods. Our results indicate that EN positively affects diversity of macrozoobenthos communities in the study area, increasing the species richness and diversity and decreasing the species dominance. EN represents a strong disturbance that affects species interactions that rule the species assembling processes in shallow-water, sea-bottom environments

Reducing cell intrinsic immunity to mRNA vaccine alters adaptive immune responses in mice

The response to mRNA vaccines needs to be sufficient for immune cell activation and recruitment, but moderate enough to ensure efficacious antigen expression. The choice of the cap structure and use of N1-methylpseudouridine (m1Ψ) instead of uridine, which have been shown to reduce RNA sensing by the cellular innate immune system, has led to improved efficacy of mRNA vaccine platforms. Understanding how RNA modifications influence the cell intrinsic immune response may help in the development of more effective mRNA vaccines. In the current study, we compared mRNA vaccines in mice against influenza virus using three different mRNA formats: uridine-containing mRNA (D1-uRNA), m1Ψ-modified mRNA (D1-modRNA), and D1-modRNA with a cap1 structure (cC1-modRNA). D1-uRNA vaccine induced a significantly different gene expression profile to the modified mRNA vaccines, with an up-regulation of Stat1 and RnaseL, and increased systemic inflammation. This result correlated with significantly reduced antigen-specific antibody responses and reduced protection against influenza virus infection compared with D1-modRNA and cC1-modRNA. Incorporation of m1Ψ alone without cap1 improved antibodies, but both modifications were required for the optimum response. Therefore, the incorporation of m1Ψ and cap1 alters protective immunity from mRNA vaccines by altering the innate immune response to the vaccine material

Pseudo-aneurysm of the anterior tibial artery, a rare cause of ankle swelling following a sports injury

BACKGROUND: Ankle pain and swelling following sports injuries are common presenting complaints to the accident and emergency department. Frequently these are diagnosed as musculoskeletal injuries, even when no definitive cause is found. Vascular injuries following trauma are uncommon and are an extremely rare cause of ankle swelling and pain. These injuries may however be limb threatening and are important to diagnose early, in order that appropriate treatment can be delivered. We highlight the steps to diagnosis of these injuries, and methods of managing these injuries. It is important for clinicians to be aware of the potential for this injury in patients with seemingly innocuous trauma from sports injuries, who have significant ankle pain and swelling. CASE PRESENTATION: A young, professional sportsman presented with a swollen, painful ankle after an innocuous hyper-plantar flexion injury whilst playing football, which was initially diagnosed as a ligamentous injury after no bony injury was revealed on X-Ray. He returned 2 days later with a large ulcer at the lateral malleolus and further investigation by duplex ultrasound and transfemoral arteriogram revealed a Pseudo-Aneurysm of the Anterior Tibial Artery. This was initially managed with percutaneous injection of thrombin, and later open surgery to ligate the feeding vessel. The patient recovered fully and was able to return to recreational sport. CONCLUSION: Vascular injuries remain a rare cause of ankle pain and swelling following sports injuries, however it is important to consider these injuries when no definite musculo-skeletal cause is found. Ultrasound duplex and Transfemoral arteriogram are appropriate, sensitive modalities for investigation, and may allow novel treatment to be directed percutaneously. Early diagnosis and intervention are essential for the successful outcome in these patients

Regeneration of goldfish retina: Rod precursors are a likely source of regenerated cells

This study describes regeneration of the neural retina in juvenile goldfish. The retina was destroyed with an intraocular injection of ouabain, a technique introduced by Wolburg and colleagues (Maier and Wolburg, 1979; Kurz-Isler and Wolburg, 1982). We confirmed their observation that the level of damage produced by the toxin was graded, in that neurons in the inner retinal layers were preferentially destroyed, and only in the more severely affected retinas were cells in the outer nuclear layer (i.e., photoreceptor cells) damaged. Evidence of retinal regeneration could be seen beginning about 2 weeks after the injection of ouabain. In contrast to previous studies (Maier and Wolburg, 1979), we found that regeneration took place only in those retinas in which photoreceptors had been destroyed. In cases in which the outer nuclear layer was spared, no regeneration of inner layers occurred, even after 6 months. Thymidine autoradiography was used to document the regeneration of new retinal neurons and to show that rod precursors, like other dividing cells, were not destroyed by the oubain, but in contrast showed an increased mitotic activity. Regeneration did not proceed uniformly, but was initiated at neurogenic foci scattered across the retina. These foci consisted of clusters of dividing neuroepithelial-like cells. The evidence is consistent with the proposal that these cells were derived from rod precursors. These results imply that rod precursors are capable of a wider range of developmental fates than they normally express.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/50078/1/480190504_ftp.pd

Measurement of the W+W-gamma Cross Section and Direct Limits on Anomalous Quartic Gauge Boson Couplings at LEP

The process e+e- -> W+W-gamma is analysed using the data collected with the L3 detector at LEP at a centre-of-mass energy of 188.6GeV, corresponding to an integrated luminosity of 176.8pb^-1. Based on a sample of 42 selected W+W- candidates containing an isolated hard photon, the W+W-gamma cross section, defined within phase-space cuts, is measured to be: sigma_WWgamma = 290 +/- 80 +/- 16 fb, consistent with the Standard Model expectation. Including the process e+e- -> nu nu gamma gamma, limits are derived on anomalous contributions to the Standard Model quartic vertices W+W- gamma gamma and W+W-Z gamma at 95% CL: -0.043 GeV^-2 < a_0/Lambda^2 < 0.043 GeV^-2 0.08 GeV^-2 < a_c/Lambda^2 < 0.13 GeV^-2 0.41 GeV^-2 < a_n/Lambda^2 < 0.37 GeV^-2