Short-term effects of air pollution on daily asthma-related emergency department visits in an industrial city

BACKGROUND: Epidemiological studies from Europe and North America have provided evidence that exposure to air pollution can aggravate symptoms in asthmatic patients. METHODS: Daily number of AEDv, air pollution levels (PM10, PM2.5, SO2, NO2 and CO) and meteorological variables was obtained from Jubail Industrial City, Saudi Arabia, for the period of 2007-11. Data were analyzed using a time-series approach. Relative risks (RRs) were estimated using Poisson regression. RESULTS: The associations between AEDv and PM10, PM2.5, SO2 and NO2 remained positive and statistically significant after mutual adjustment in the multi-pollutant model.The RR of AEDv increased by 5.4, 4.4, 3.4 and 2.2% per an inter-quartile range increase in SO2 (2.0 ppb), PM2.5 (36 μg/m3), NO2 (7.6 ppb) and PM10 (140 μg/m3), respectively. No significant associations between AEDv and CO were found. CONCLUSIONS: Current levels of ambient air pollution are associated with AEDv in this industrial setting in the Middle East. Greater awareness of environmental health protection and the implementation of effective measures to improve the quality of air in such settings would be beneficial to public health

Changing epidemiology and age-specific incidence of cutaneous malignant melanoma in England: an analysis of the national cancer registration data by age, gender and anatomical site, 1981 2018

Background: The incidence of cutaneous malignant melanoma, which is mostly attributable (86%) to UV radiation exposure, has been steadily increasing over the past four decades in predominantly fair-skinned populations. Although public health campaigns are increasing sun-protective behaviour in England, their effect on melanoma incidence is largely unknown. We conducted a retrospective population-based cohort study to examine whether there have been changes in the epidemiology of melanoma in England during the past four decades. Methods: Individual level data for patients diagnosed with melanoma in England during 1981-2018 were obtained from the Office for National Statistics/Public Health England. Average annual incidence rates were calculated by three age categories (0-34, 35-64, 65+ years), gender and anatomical site during the seven five-year time periods (1981-85 to 2011-15) and the recent three-year period (2016-18). The percentage change in incidence was calculated as change in the average incidence rate from the first (1981-85) to the last time period (2016-18). The Average Annual Percentage Change (AAPC) was estimated using the slope of the linear trend line fitted to the incidence rates by year of diagnosis. Findings: During the 38-year period (1981-2018), a total of 265,302 cases of melanoma (45.7% males, 54.3% females) were registered in England. The average annual number of cases increased from 837/year in 1981-85 to 6,963/year in 2016-18 in males (+732%), and from 1,609/year in 1981-85 to 6,952/year in 2016-18 in females (+332%). In the young age-group (0-34 years), the average annual incidence rates initially increased from 1981-85 to 2001-05 and then stabilised during the recent period (2006-18). In the middle age group (35-64 years), the rates increased by +332% (AAPC, 10.4%) in males (from 5.6/100,000 in 1981-85 to 24.2/100,000 in 2016-18) and +185% (AAPC, 5.7%) in females (from 10.2/100,000 in 1981-85 to 29.1/100,000 in 2016-18); and in the old age-group (65+ years) the rates increased by +842% (AAPC, 25.7%) in males (from 9.6/100,000 in 1981-85 to 90.4/100,000 in 2016-18) and +381% (AAPC 11.2%) in females (from 12.5/100,000 in 1981-85 to 60.1/100,000 in 2016-18). The largest increase in incidence in both males and females was observed for melanoma of the trunk (+817%, AAPC, 24.8% in males and +613%, AAPC, 18.3% in females), followed by melanoma of upper limb (+750%, AAPC, 22.9% in males and 518%, AAPC, 15.5% in females). Interpretation: It appears that the incidence of melanoma among young people in England has stabilised (or levelled off) in recent decades, whereas it continues to increase substantially in older population. These findings suggest that public health campaigns targeted at children/adolescents/parents may be favourably influencing melanoma incidence. The steeper increase in incidence in males is consistent with their relatively greater sun exposure and poor sun-protective behaviour. All the available evidence suggests that the enormous increase in the melanoma of the trunk and upper limb, since the 1980s, is most likely due to increasing trend in intermittent high intensity recreational UV radiation exposure (e.g. sunbathing, holidaying in places with strong sunlight, indoor tanning)

Space–time clustering of elevated thyroid stimulating hormone levels

International audiencePrevious studies of congenital hypothyroidism (CHT) have reported an increasing incidence which may suggest that environmental factors play an aetiological role. If so, then cases may exhibit space-time clustering, where cases occur at similar times and close proximities to other cases. In this study we investigated whether space-time clustering of elevated thyroid stimulating hormone (TSH) in newborns exists. All infants born in the Northern Region of England are screened by measuring levels of circulating TSH using a blood spot assay. Data on 207 cases of elevated TSH values, as a proxy for CHT, in newborns born from 1994 to 2006 inclusive were available and analysed using rigorous space-time clustering statistical methods. Analysis showed statistically significant evidence of space-time clustering. The strength of clustering was most marked for cases born within 0.1-0.7 year (1-8 months) of one another. This is the first study to find significant space-time clustering of cases of elevated TSH levels in newborns, a surrogate for space-time clustering of CHT. Whilst the reasons for the clustering are unclear, it would appear from this analysis that transient environmental exposures are likely to be involved, although environmental determinants of genetic mutations and epigenetic factors cannot be ruled out. Further research is required to a) validate these results in other populations and b) to assess in more detail the potential environmental determinants of increased CHT risk

All-flavor constraints on nonstandard neutrino interactions and generalized matter potential with three years of IceCube DeepCore data

We report constraints on nonstandard neutrino interactions (NSI) from the observation of atmospheric neutrinos with IceCube, limiting all individual coupling strengths from a single dataset. Furthermore, IceCube is the first experiment to constrain flavor-violating and nonuniversal couplings simultaneously. Hypothetical NSI are generically expected to arise due to the exchange of a new heavy mediator particle. Neutrinos propagating in matter scatter off fermions in the forward direction with negligible momentum transfer. Hence the study of the matter effect on neutrinos propagating in the Earth is sensitive to NSI independently of the energy scale of new physics. We present constraints on NSI obtained with an all-flavor event sample of atmospheric neutrinos based on three years of IceCube DeepCore data. The analysis uses neutrinos arriving from all directions, with reconstructed energies between 5.6 GeV and 100 GeV. We report constraints on the individual NSI coupling strengths considered singly, allowing for complex phases in the case of flavor-violating couplings. This demonstrates that IceCube is sensitive to the full NSI flavor structure at a level competitive with limits from the global analysis of all other experiments. In addition, we investigate a generalized matter potential, whose overall scale and flavor structure are also constrained

Searches for Neutrinos from Gamma-Ray Bursts using the IceCube Neutrino Observatory

Gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) are considered as promising sources of ultra-high-energy cosmic rays (UHECRs) due to their large power output. Observing a neutrino flux from GRBs would offer evidence that GRBs are hadronic accelerators of UHECRs. Previous IceCube analyses, which primarily focused on neutrinos arriving in temporal coincidence with the prompt gamma rays, found no significant neutrino excess. The four analyses presented in this paper extend the region of interest to 14 days before and after the prompt phase, including generic extended time windows and targeted precursor searches. GRBs were selected between May 2011 and October 2018 to align with the data set of candidate muon-neutrino events observed by IceCube. No evidence of correlation between neutrino events and GRBs was found in these analyses. Limits are set to constrain the contribution of the cosmic GRB population to the diffuse astrophysical neutrino flux observed by IceCube. Prompt neutrino emission from GRBs is limited to $\lesssim$1% of the observed diffuse neutrino flux, and emission on timescales up to $10^4$ s is constrained to 24% of the total diffuse flux

Searching for High-energy Neutrino Emission from Galaxy Clusters with IceCube

Galaxy clusters have the potential to accelerate cosmic rays (CRs) to ultrahigh energies via accretion shocks or embedded CR acceleration sites. The CRs with energies below the Hillas condition will be confined within the cluster and eventually interact with the intracluster medium gas to produce secondary neutrinos and gamma rays. Using 9.5 yr of muon neutrino track events from the IceCube Neutrino Observatory, we report the results of a stacking analysis of 1094 galaxy clusters with masses ≳10$^{14}$ M⊙ and redshifts between 0.01 and ∼1 detected by the Planck mission via the Sunyaev–Zel’dovich effect. We find no evidence for significant neutrino emission and report upper limits on the cumulative unresolved neutrino flux from massive galaxy clusters after accounting for the completeness of the catalog up to a redshift of 2, assuming three different weighting scenarios for the stacking and three different power-law spectra. Weighting the sources according to mass and distance, we set upper limits at a 90% confidence level that constrain the flux of neutrinos from massive galaxy clusters (≳10$^{14}$ M⊙) to be no more than 4.6% of the diffuse IceCube observations at 100 TeV, assuming an unbroken E−$^{2.5}$ power-law spectrum

Strong Constraints on Neutrino Nonstandard Interactions from TeV-Scale νμ_{μ} Disappearance at IceCube

We report a search for nonstandard neutrino interactions (NSI) using eight years of TeV-scale atmospheric muon neutrino data from the IceCube Neutrino Observatory. By reconstructing incident energies and zenith angles for atmospheric neutrino events, this analysis presents unified confidence intervals for the NSI parameter εμτ. The best-fit value is consistent with no NSI at a p value of 25.2%. With a 90% confidence interval of −0.0041≤εμτ≤0.0031 along the real axis and similar strength in the complex plane, this result is the strongest constraint on any NSI parameter from any oscillation channel to date

Search for Quantum Gravity Using Astrophysical Neutrino Flavour with IceCube

Along their long propagation from production to detection, neutrino states undergo quantum interference which converts their types, or flavours. High-energy astrophysical neutrinos, first observed by the IceCube Neutrino Observatory, are known to propagate unperturbed over a billion light years in vacuum. These neutrinos act as the largest quantum interferometer and are sensitive to the smallest effects in vacuum due to new physics. Quantum gravity (QG) aims to describe gravity in a quantum mechanical framework, unifying matter, forces and space-time. QG effects are expected to appear at the ultra-high-energy scale known as the Planck energy, $E_{P}\equiv 1.22\times 10^{19}$~giga-electronvolts (GeV). Such a high-energy universe would have existed only right after the Big Bang and it is inaccessible by human technologies. On the other hand, it is speculated that the effects of QG may exist in our low-energy vacuum, but are suppressed by the Planck energy as $E_{P}^{-1}$ ($\sim 10^{-19}$~GeV$^{-1}$), $E_{P}^{-2}$ ($\sim 10^{-38}$~GeV$^{-2}$), or its higher powers. The coupling of particles to these effects is too small to measure in kinematic observables, but the phase shift of neutrino waves could cause observable flavour conversions. Here, we report the first result of neutrino interferometry~\cite{Aartsen:2017ibm} using astrophysical neutrino flavours to search for new space-time structure. We did not find any evidence of anomalous flavour conversion in IceCube astrophysical neutrino flavour data. We place the most stringent limits of any known technologies, down to $10^{-42}$~GeV$^{-2}$, on the dimension-six operators that parameterize the space-time defects for preferred astrophysical production scenarios. For the first time, we unambiguously reach the signal region of quantum-gravity-motivated physics.Comment: The main text is 7 pages with 3 figures and 1 table. The Appendix includes 5 pages with 3 figure

Multi-messenger observations of a binary neutron star merger

On 2017 August 17 a binary neutron star coalescence candidate (later designated GW170817) with merger time 12:41:04 UTC was observed through gravitational waves by the Advanced LIGO and Advanced Virgo detectors. The Fermi Gamma-ray Burst Monitor independently detected a gamma-ray burst (GRB 170817A) with a time delay of ~1.7 s with respect to the merger time. From the gravitational-wave signal, the source was initially localized to a sky region of 31 deg2 at a luminosity distance of 40+8-8 Mpc and with component masses consistent with neutron stars. The component masses were later measured to be in the range 0.86 to 2.26 Mo. An extensive observing campaign was launched across the electromagnetic spectrum leading to the discovery of a bright optical transient (SSS17a, now with the IAU identification of AT 2017gfo) in NGC 4993 (at ~40 Mpc) less than 11 hours after the merger by the One- Meter, Two Hemisphere (1M2H) team using the 1 m Swope Telescope. The optical transient was independently detected by multiple teams within an hour. Subsequent observations targeted the object and its environment. Early ultraviolet observations revealed a blue transient that faded within 48 hours. Optical and infrared observations showed a redward evolution over ~10 days. Following early non-detections, X-ray and radio emission were discovered at the transient’s position ~9 and ~16 days, respectively, after the merger. Both the X-ray and radio emission likely arise from a physical process that is distinct from the one that generates the UV/optical/near-infrared emission. No ultra-high-energy gamma-rays and no neutrino candidates consistent with the source were found in follow-up searches. These observations support the hypothesis that GW170817 was produced by the merger of two neutron stars in NGC4993 followed by a short gamma-ray burst (GRB 170817A) and a kilonova/macronova powered by the radioactive decay of r-process nuclei synthesized in the ejecta