Foodborne disease outbreaks in Australia 2001-2009

BACKGROUND: Analysis of surveillance data from foodborne disease outbreaks can help identify high-risk aetiological agents, food vehicles and settings. This information may help prevent future illness by informing the development of public health policy

Event Shapes and Power Corrections in ep DIS

Deep-inelastic ep scattering data, taken with the H1 detector at HERA, are used to study the event shape variables thrust, jet broadening, jet mass, C parameter, and two kinds of differential two-jet rates over a large range of ``relevant energy'' Q between 7 GeV and 100 GeV. The Q dependence of the mean values is fit to second order calculations of perturbative QCD applying power law corrections proportional to 1/Q^p to account for hadronization effects. The concept of these power corrections is tested by a systematic investigation in terms of a non-perturbative parameter alpha_{p-1} and the strong coupling constant.Comment: 3 pages, 1 table (latex, including npb.sty), 3 figures (eps), to be published in the Proc. of the DIS99 Workshop, Berlin, 199

Infection by agnoprotein-negative mutants of polyomavirus JC and SV40 results in the release of virions that are mostly deficient in DNA content

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Human polyomavirus JC (JCV) is the etiologic agent of a brain disease, known as progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy (PML). The JCV genome encodes a small multifunctional phospho-protein, agnoprotein, from the late coding region of the virus, whose regulatory functions in viral replication cycle remain elusive. In this work, the functional role of JCV and SV40 agnoproteins in virion release was investigated using a point mutant (Pt) of each virus, where the ATG codon of agnoprotein was mutated to abrogate its expression.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Analysis of both viral protein expression and replication using Pt mutant of each virus revealed that both processes were substantially down-regulated in the absence of agnoprotein compared to wild-type (WT) virus. Complementation studies in cells, which are constitutively expressing JCV agnoprotein and transfected with the JCV Pt mutant genome, showed an elevation in the level of viral DNA replication near to that observed for WT. Constitutive expression of large T antigen was found to be not sufficient to compensate the loss of agnoprotein for efficient replication of neither JCV nor SV40 in vivo. Examination of the viral release process for both JCV and SV40 Pt mutants showed that viral particles are efficiently released from the infected cells in the absence of agnoprotein but were found to be mostly deficient in viral DNA content.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>The results of this study provide evidence that agnoprotein plays an important role in the polyomavirus JC and SV40 life cycle. Infection by agnoprotein-negative mutants of both viruses results in the release of virions that are mostly deficient in DNA content.</p

Methods for a rapid systematic review and meta-analysis in evaluating selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors for premature ejaculation

The aim of this study was to evaluate a rapid systematic review method in which randomised controlled trial (RCT) data was extracted from existing reviews and subsequent RCTs. The method enabled: identification of RCTs not included by existing reviews; cross-checking RCT data for consistency where there was more than one review; double data extraction due to time saved by extracting data from existing reviews; correction of data synthesis errors in existing reviews; and pooling data across all RCTs to produce contemporary effect estimates. When subsequently compared to extracting data directly from all RCT original publications, the findings and conclusions concurred

Treatment challenges in and outside a specialist network setting: Pancreatic neuroendocrine tumours

Pancreatic Neuroendocrine Neoplasms comprise a group of rare tumours with special biology, an often indolent behaviour and particular diagnostic and therapeutic requirements. The specialized biochemical tests and radiological investigations, the complexity of surgical options and the variety of medical treatments that require individual tailoring, mandate a multidisciplinary approach that can be optimally achieved through an organized network. The present study describes currents concepts in the management of these tumours as well as an insight into the challenges of delivering the pathway in and outside a Network

Median computation in graphs using consensus strategies

Following the Majority Strategy in graphs, other consensus strategies, namely Plurality Strategy, Hill Climbing and Steepest Ascent Hill Climbing strategies on graphs are discussed as methods for the computation of median sets of profiles. A review of algorithms for median computation on median graphs is discussed and their time complexities are compared. Implementation of the consensus strategies on median computation in arbitrary graphs is discussed

The plurality strategy on graphs

The Majority Strategy for finding medians of a set of clients on a graph can be relaxed in the following way: if we are at v, then we move to a neighbor w if there are at least as many clients closer to w than to v (thus ignoring the clients at equal distance from v and w). The graphs on which this Plurality Strategy always finds the set of all medians are precisely those for which the set of medians induces always a connected subgraph

Lucky Girls: Unintentional Avoidance of Adolescent Pregnancy Among Low-Income African-American Females

To describe lucky adolescents who unintentionally avoid pregnancy. DESIGN AND METHODS . The second phase of a descriptive qualitative study in which 17 low-income African-American females ages 19 to 26 participated in open-ended interviews on how they avoided pregnancy as adolescents. RESULTS . Constant comparative analysis revealed that five of the girls avoided pregnancy because they were “lucky“ that others insisted they use contraceptives. These lucky girls were unaware of sexual risks, but used contraceptives because they complied with decisions made by their parents, grandparents, and partners. PRACTICE IMPLICATIONS . Lucky girls are at risk for adolescent pregnancy because they abdicate decision making to others and are likely to be overlooked in practice because they are using contraceptives. Promoting self-protection includes assessment, knowledge, skills-building strategies, and health-promoting contracts between the nurse and adolescent.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/73296/1/j.1744-6155.2002.tb00171.x.pd

The Swedish monitoring of surface waters: 50 years of adaptive monitoring

For more than 50 years, scientific insights from surface water monitoring have supported Swedish evidence-based environmental management. Efforts to understand and control eutrophication in the 1960s led to construction of wastewater treatment plants with phosphorus retention, while acid rain research in the 1970s contributed to international legislation curbing emissions. By the 1990s, long-time series were being used to infer climate effects on surface water chemistry and biology. Monitoring data play a key role in implementing the EU Water Framework Directive and other legislation and have been used to show beneficial effects of agricultural management on Baltic Sea eutrophication. The Swedish experience demonstrates that well-designed and financially supported surface water monitoring can be used to understand and manage a range of stressors and societal concerns. Using scientifically sound adaptive monitoring principles to balance continuity and change has ensured long-time series and the capability to address new questions over time