From Body to Mind and Spirit: Qigong Exercise for Bereaved Persons with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome-Like Illness

Bereavement may bring negative impacts on the mind, body, and spiritual well-being of grieving persons. Bereavement as a major negative life event is also a risk factor for chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS). . Some bereaved persons with chronic fatigue syndrome- (CFS-) like illness experience a dual burden of distress. This study investigated the effects of bereavement on CFS-like illness by comparing bereaved and nonbereaved participants. It also adopted a random group design to investigate the effectiveness of Qigong on improving the well-being of bereaved persons with CFS-like illnessparticipants. The Qigong intervention comprised 10 group sessions delivered twice a week for 5 weeks and home-practice for at least three times a week lasting 15-30 minutes each lasting 15–30 minutes each. The participants’ fatigue, anxiety, and depression, quality of life (QoL), and spiritual well-being were measured at baseline and 3 months after treatment. The bereaved participants experienced significantly greater mental fatigue (16.09 versus 14.44,published_or_final_versio

Validation of the Drug Abuse Screening Test (Dast-10): A Study on Illicit Drug Use among Chinese Pregnant Women

published_or_final_versio

Three-dimensional coherent X-ray diffraction imaging of a ceramic nanofoam: determination of structural deformation mechanisms

Ultra-low density polymers, metals, and ceramic nanofoams are valued for their high strength-to-weight ratio, high surface area and insulating properties ascribed to their structural geometry. We obtain the labrynthine internal structure of a tantalum oxide nanofoam by X-ray diffractive imaging. Finite element analysis from the structure reveals mechanical properties consistent with bulk samples and with a diffusion limited cluster aggregation model, while excess mass on the nodes discounts the dangling fragments hypothesis of percolation theory.Comment: 8 pages, 5 figures, 30 reference

Evidence of individual differences in the long-term social, psychological, and cognitive consequences of child maltreatment

Background: The prevalence and consequences of child maltreatment are alarming, but evidence from studies with long follow-up intervals are limited. This study examined the long-term consequences of child maltreatment in relation to age of onset and follow-up interval. / Methods: The exposed group comprised 63 individuals (aged 13–34 years) with a first-time diagnosis of child maltreatment between 2001 and 2010, whereas the unexposed group comprised 63 individuals who were matched upon gender, age of onset, follow-up period, and poverty status at the index hospital admission but had no medical records of maltreatment in Hong Kong. The participants completed a set of questionnaires on executive functions and mental health and provided blood samples for measurement of IL-6 and IL-10 levels during a health assessment session. / Results: Compared with the unexposed group, the exposed group reported poorer maternal care during childhood (β = −4.64, p < 0.001) and had lower family support (β = −2.97, p = 0.010) and higher inflammatory responses (IL-6: β = 0.15, p = 0.001; IL-10: β = 0.11, p = 0.011) at follow-up. Additionally, the associations of childhood maltreatment exposure with family support and maternal care differed by age of onset and the length of time since exposure. / Conclusions: This matched cohort study highlights childhood maltreatment as a risk factor for systemic inflammation and an indicator of suboptimal social environment, both of which could persist over a long period of time

Local behavior of p-harmonic Green's functions in metric spaces

We describe the behavior of p-harmonic Green's functions near a singularity in metric measure spaces equipped with a doubling measure and supporting a Poincar\'e inequality

Ordering phenomena in quasi one-dimensional organic conductors

Low-dimensional organic conductors could establish themselves as model systems for the investigation of the physics in reduced dimensions. In the metallic state of a one-dimensional solid, Fermi-liquid theory breaks down and spin and charge degrees of freedom become separated. But the metallic phase is not stable in one dimension: as the temperature is reduced, the electronic charge and spin tend to arrange themselves in an ordered fashion due to strong correlations. The competition of the different interactions is responsible for which broken-symmetry ground state is eventually realized in a specific compound and which drives the system towards an insulating state. Here we review the various ordering phenomena and how they can be identified by optic and magnetic measurements. While the final results might look very similar in the case of a charge density wave and a charge-ordered metal, for instance, the physical cause is completely different. When density waves form, a gap opens in the density of states at the Fermi energy due to nesting of the one-dimension Fermi surface sheets. When a one-dimensional metal becomes a charge-ordered Mott insulator, on the other hand, the short-range Coulomb repulsion localizes the charge on the lattice sites and even causes certain charge patterns. We try to point out the similarities and conceptional differences of these phenomena and give an example for each of them. Particular emphasis will be put on collective phenomena which are inherently present as soon as ordering breaks the symmetry of the system.Comment: Review article Naturwissenschaften 200

Disparities and risks of sexually transmissible infections among men who have sex with men in China: a meta-analysis and data synthesis.

BACKGROUND: Sexually transmitted infections (STIs), including Hepatitis B and C virus, are emerging public health risks in China, especially among men who have sex with men (MSM). This study aims to assess the magnitude and risks of STIs among Chinese MSM. METHODS: Chinese and English peer-reviewed articles were searched in five electronic databases from January 2000 to February 2013. Pooled prevalence estimates for each STI infection were calculated using meta-analysis. Infection risks of STIs in MSM, HIV-positive MSM and male sex workers (MSW) were obtained. This review followed the PRISMA guidelines and was registered in PROSPERO. RESULTS: Eighty-eight articles (11 in English and 77 in Chinese) investigating 35,203 MSM in 28 provinces were included in this review. The prevalence levels of STIs among MSM were 6.3% (95% CI: 3.5-11.0%) for chlamydia, 1.5% (0.7-2.9%) for genital wart, 1.9% (1.3-2.7%) for gonorrhoea, 8.9% (7.8-10.2%) for hepatitis B (HBV), 1.2% (1.0-1.6%) for hepatitis C (HCV), 66.3% (57.4-74.1%) for human papillomavirus (HPV), 10.6% (6.2-17.6%) for herpes simplex virus (HSV-2) and 4.3% (3.2-5.8%) for Ureaplasma urealyticum. HIV-positive MSM have consistently higher odds of all these infections than the broader MSM population. As a subgroup of MSM, MSW were 2.5 (1.4-4.7), 5.7 (2.7-12.3), and 2.2 (1.4-3.7) times more likely to be infected with chlamydia, gonorrhoea and HCV than the broader MSM population, respectively. CONCLUSION: Prevalence levels of STIs among MSW were significantly higher than the broader MSM population. Co-infection of HIV and STIs were prevalent among Chinese MSM. Integration of HIV and STIs healthcare and surveillance systems is essential in providing effective HIV/STIs preventive measures and treatments. TRIAL REGISTRATION: PROSPERO NO: CRD42013003721

Determining the neurotransmitter concentration profile at active synapses

Establishing the temporal and concentration profiles of neurotransmitters during synaptic release is an essential step towards understanding the basic properties of inter-neuronal communication in the central nervous system. A variety of ingenious attempts has been made to gain insights into this process, but the general inaccessibility of central synapses, intrinsic limitations of the techniques used, and natural variety of different synaptic environments have hindered a comprehensive description of this fundamental phenomenon. Here, we describe a number of experimental and theoretical findings that has been instrumental for advancing our knowledge of various features of neurotransmitter release, as well as newly developed tools that could overcome some limits of traditional pharmacological approaches and bring new impetus to the description of the complex mechanisms of synaptic transmission

Search for new phenomena in final states with an energetic jet and large missing transverse momentum in pp collisions at √ s = 8 TeV with the ATLAS detector

Results of a search for new phenomena in final states with an energetic jet and large missing transverse momentum are reported. The search uses 20.3 fb−1 of √ s = 8 TeV data collected in 2012 with the ATLAS detector at the LHC. Events are required to have at least one jet with pT > 120 GeV and no leptons. Nine signal regions are considered with increasing missing transverse momentum requirements between Emiss T > 150 GeV and Emiss T > 700 GeV. Good agreement is observed between the number of events in data and Standard Model expectations. The results are translated into exclusion limits on models with either large extra spatial dimensions, pair production of weakly interacting dark matter candidates, or production of very light gravitinos in a gauge-mediated supersymmetric model. In addition, limits on the production of an invisibly decaying Higgs-like boson leading to similar topologies in the final state are presente

Observation of associated near-side and away-side long-range correlations in √sNN=5.02 TeV proton-lead collisions with the ATLAS detector

Two-particle correlations in relative azimuthal angle (Δϕ) and pseudorapidity (Δη) are measured in √sNN=5.02  TeV p+Pb collisions using the ATLAS detector at the LHC. The measurements are performed using approximately 1  μb-1 of data as a function of transverse momentum (pT) and the transverse energy (ΣETPb) summed over 3.1<η<4.9 in the direction of the Pb beam. The correlation function, constructed from charged particles, exhibits a long-range (2<|Δη|<5) “near-side” (Δϕ∼0) correlation that grows rapidly with increasing ΣETPb. A long-range “away-side” (Δϕ∼π) correlation, obtained by subtracting the expected contributions from recoiling dijets and other sources estimated using events with small ΣETPb, is found to match the near-side correlation in magnitude, shape (in Δη and Δϕ) and ΣETPb dependence. The resultant Δϕ correlation is approximately symmetric about π/2, and is consistent with a dominant cos⁡2Δϕ modulation for all ΣETPb ranges and particle pT