Taxonomic Richness and Diversity of Larval Fish Assemblages in the Oceanic Gulf of Mexico: Links to Oceanographic Conditions

Biodiversity enhances the productivity and stability of marine ecosystems and provides important ecosystem services. The aim of this study was to characterize larval fish assemblages in pelagic waters of the northern Gulf of Mexico (NGoM) and identify oceanographic conditions associated with areas of increased taxonomic richness (T ) and Shannon diversity (H’). Summer ichthyoplankton surveys were conducted in the NGoM in 2015 and 2016 using neuston net (surface layer; upper 1 m) and oblique bongo net (mixed layer; 0–100 m) tows. Over 17,000 fish larvae were collected over the two-year study, and 99 families of fish larvae were present. Catch composition in the surface layer was relatively similar to the mixed-layer catch, with carangids (jacks), scombrids (mackerels, tunas), and exocoetids (flyingfishes) being numerically dominant, while deep-pelagic species, including myctophids (lanternfishes), gonostomatids (bristlemouths), and sternoptychids (marine hatchetfishes), were present almost exclusively in the mixed layer samples. Generalized additive models were used to evaluate the effect of oceanographic conditions on ichthyoplankton abundance and biodiversity. Salinity and sea surface height (SSH) were the most influential oceanographic conditions, with higher occurrence, higher T , and higher H’ all present in areas of lower salinity, and lower SSH. This study highlights the ecological importance of cyclonic mesoscale features and areas of upwelling as areas of increased biodiversity for larval fishes, and also indicates that the mixed layer in the NGoM is essential habitat for deep-pelagic fishes during the early life interval. F

Potential associations between behavior change techniques and engagement with mobile health apps: a systematic review

IntroductionLack of engagement is a common challenge for digital health interventions. To achieve their potential, it is necessary to understand how best to support users’ engagement with interventions and target health behaviors. The aim of this systematic review was to identify the behavioral theories and behavior change techniques being incorporated into mobile health apps and how they are associated with the different components of engagement.MethodsThe review was structured using the PRISMA and PICOS frameworks and searched six databases in July 2022: PubMed, Embase, CINAHL, APA PsycArticles, ScienceDirect, and Web of Science. Risk of bias was evaluated using the Cochrane Collaboration Risk of Bias 2 and the Mixed Methods Appraisal Tools.AnalysisA descriptive analysis provided an overview of study and app characteristics and evidence for potential associations between Behavior Change Techniques (BCTs) and engagement was examined.ResultsThe final analysis included 28 studies. Six BCTs were repeatedly associated with user engagement: goal setting, self-monitoring of behavior, feedback on behavior, prompts/cues, rewards, and social support. There was insufficient data reported to examine associations with specific components of engagement, but the analysis indicated that the different components were being captured by various measures.ConclusionThis review provides further evidence supporting the use of common BCTs in mobile health apps. To enable developers to leverage BCTs and other app features to optimize engagement in specific contexts and individual characteristics, we need a better understanding of how BCTs are associated with different components of engagement.Systematic review registrationhttps://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/, identifier CRD42022312596

The role of health kiosks: a scoping review

Background: Health kiosks are publicly accessible computing devices that provide access to services including health information provision, clinical measurement collection, patient self-check-in, telemonitoring and teleconsultation. While the increase in internet access and ownership of smart personal devices could make kiosks redundant, recent reports have predicted that the market will continue to grow. Objectives: We sought to clarify the current and future roles of health kiosks by investigating: (a) the setting, role, and clinical domains in which kiosks are used; (b) whether usability evaluations of health kiosks are being reported and if so, what methods are being utilized; and (c) what the barriers and facilitators are for the deployment of kiosks. Methods: We conducted a scoping review by a bibliographic search of the Google Scholar, PubMed and Web of Science databases for studies and other publications between January 2009 and June 2020. Eligible papers describe the implementation, either as primary studies, systematic reviews, or news and feature articles. Additional reports were obtained by manual searching and through querying key informants. For each article we abstracted settings, purposes, health domains, whether the kiosk was opportunistic or integrated with a clinical pathway, and inclusion of usability testing. We then summarized the data in frequency tables. Results: A total of 141 articles were included, 134 primary studies and seven reviews. 47% of the primary studies described kiosks in secondary care settings, other settings included community (23.9%), primary care (17.9%), and pharmacies (6.0%). The most common roles of health kiosks were providing health information (35.1%), taking clinical measurements (20.9%), screening (12.7%), telehealth (8.2%), and patient registration (6.0%). The five most frequent health domains were multiple conditions (24.6%), Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) (7.5%), hypertension (7.5%), pediatric injuries (5.2%), health and wellbeing (4.5%) and drug monitoring (4.5%). Kiosks were integrated in the clinical pathway in 70.1%, opportunistic kiosks accounted for 23.9% and 6.0% were being used in both. Usability evaluations of the kiosk were reported in 20.1% of the papers. Barriers (use of expensive proprietary software) and enablers (handling on-demand consultations) to deploying health kiosks were identified. Conclusions: Health kiosks still play a vital role in the healthcare system, including collecting clinical measurements and providing access to online health services and information to those with little or no digital literacy skills, and others without personal internet access. We identified research gaps, such as training needs for teleconsultations, and scant reporting on usability evaluation methods

Dynamics of atoms within atoms

Recent experiments with Bose-Einstein condensates have entered a regime in which thousands of ground-state condensate atoms fill the Rydberg-electron orbit. After the excitation of a single atom into a highly excited Rydberg state, scattering off the Rydberg electron sets ground-state atoms into motion, such that one can study the quantum-many-body dynamics of atoms moving within the Rydberg atom. Here we study this many-body dynamics using Gross-Pitaevskii and truncated Wigner theory. Our simulations focus in particular on the scenario of multiple sequential Rydberg excitations on the same Rubidium condensate which has become the standard tool to observe quantum impurity dynamics in Rydberg experiments. We investigate to what extent such experiments can be sensitive to details in the electron-atom interaction potential, such as the rapid radial modulation of the Rydberg molecular potential, or p-wave shape resonance. We demonstrate that both effects are crucial for the initial condensate response within the Rydberg orbit, but become less relevant for the density waves emerging outside the Rydberg excitation region at later times. Finally we explore the local dynamics of condensate heating. We find that it provides only minor corrections to the mean-field dynamics.Comment: 27 pages and 10 figure

Automated Measurement of Spatially Resolved Hair-Hair Single Fiber Adhesion.

The adhesion force between individual human hair fibers in a crosshair geometry was measured by observing their natural bending and adhesive jumps out of contact, using optical video microscopy. The hair fibers' natural elastic responses, calibrated by measuring their natural resonant frequencies, were used to measure the forces. Using a custom-designed, automated apparatus to measure thousands of individual hair-hair contacts along millimeter length scales of hair, it was found that a broad, yet characteristic, spatially variant distribution in adhesion force is measured on the 1 to 1000 nN scale for both clean and conditioner-treated hair fibers. Comparison between the measured adhesion forces and adhesion forces modeled from the hairs' surface topography (measured using confocal laser profilometry) shows they have a good order-of-magnitude agreement and have similar breadth and shape. The agreement between the measurements and the model suggests, perhaps unsurprisingly, that hair-hair adhesion is governed, to a first approximation, by the unique surface structure of the hairs' cuticles and, therefore, the large distribution in local mean curvature at the various individual contact points along the hairs' lengths. We posit that haircare products could best control the surface properties (or at least the adhesive properties) between hairs by directly modifying the hair surface microstructure

Ferrimagnetism and disorder in epitaxial Mn(2-x)Co(x)VAl thin films

The quaternary full Heusler compound Mn(2-x)Co(x)VAl with x = 1 is predicted to be a half-metallic antiferromagnet. Thin films of the quaternary compounds with x = 0...2 were prepared by DC and RF magnetron co-sputtering on heated MgO (001) substrates. The magnetic structure was examined by x-ray magnetic circular dichroism and the chemical disorder was characterized by x-ray diffraction. Ferrimagnetic coupling of V to Mn was observed for Mn2VAl (x = 0). For x = 0.5, we also found ferrimagnetic order with V and Co antiparallel to Mn. The observed reduced magnetic moments are interpreted with the help of band structure calculations in the coherent potential approximation. Mn2VAl is very sensitive to disorder involving Mn, because nearest-neighbor Mn atoms couple anti-ferromagnetically. Co2VAl has B2 order and has reduced magnetization. In the cases with x >= 0.9 conventional ferromagnetism was observed, closely related to the atomic disorder in these compounds.Comment: 10 pages, 4 figure

Incorporating usability evaluation into iterative development of an online platform to support research participation in Parkinson\u27s disease: A mixed methods protocol

\ua9 Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2023. Re-use permitted under CC BY-NC. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ. Introduction Many people with Parkinson\u27s (PwP) are not given the opportunity or do not have adequate access to participate in clinical research. To address this, we have codeveloped with users an online platform that connects PwP to clinical studies in their local area. It enables site staff to communicate with potential participants and aims to increase the participation of the Parkinson\u27s community in research. This protocol outlines the mixed methods study protocol for the usability testing of the platform. Methods and analysis We will seek user input to finalise the platform\u27s design, which will then be deployed in a limited launch for beta testing. The beta version will be used as a recruitment tool for up to three studies with multiple UK sites. Usability data will be collected from the three intended user groups: PwP, care partners acting on their behalf and site study coordinators. Usability questionnaires and website analytics will be used to capture user experience quantitatively, and a purposive sample of users will be invited to provide further feedback via semistructured interviews. Quantitative data will be analysed using descriptive statistics, and a thematic analysis undertaken for interview data. Data from this study will inform future platform iterations. Ethics and dissemination Ethical approval was obtained from the University of Plymouth (3291; 3 May 2022). We will share our findings via a \u27Latest News\u27 section within the platform, presentations, conference meetings and national PwP networks