Socio-economic determinants of road traffic accident fatalities in low and middle income countries

In low and middle income countries road traffic accident fatalities will become in the near future one of the three major causes of death. Given that in particular the active population accounts for these fatalities, the potential economic implications are large, on the micro and the macro level. Yet, so far not much is known about the determinants and economic consequences of low road safety, in particular about the factors influencing road users’ behavior. Obviously this makes the design of interventions to prevent road traffic accidents and to care for the victims a serious challenge. The objective of this note is to summarize and review the existing knowledge on the determinants of road traffic accident fatalities, to identify the relevant research gaps in particular for low and middle income countries and to suggest ways to collect data and to conduct experiments that help to close these gaps. We also present a cross-country analysis of the determinants of road traffic accident fatalities that takes into account a wide range of potential environmental, economic and social factors

Determinants of road traffic crash fatalities across Indian States

Objective: This paper explores the determinants of road traffic crash fatalities in India. As potential factors, the analysis considers, besides income, the sociodemographic populationstructure, motorization levels, road and health infrastructure and road rule enforcement. Methods: An original panel data set covering 25 Indian states is analyzed using multivariate regression analysis. Time and state fixed effects account for unobserved heterogeneity across states and time. Results: Rising motorization, urbanization and the accompanying increase in the share of vulnerable road users, i.e. pedestrians and two-wheelers, are the major drivers of road traffic crash fatalities in India. Among vulnerable road users, women form a particularly high risk group. Higher expenditure per policeman is associated with a lower fatality rate. Conclusion: The results suggest that India should focus, in particular, on road infrastructure investments that allow the separation of vulnerable from other road users, on improved road rule enforcement and should pay special attention to vulnerable female road users

Design and fabrication of an autonomous rendezvous and docking sensor using off-the-shelf hardware

NASA Marshall Space Flight Center (MSFC) has developed and tested an engineering model of an automated rendezvous and docking sensor system composed of a video camera ringed with laser diodes at two wavelengths and a standard remote manipulator system target that has been modified with retro-reflective tape and 830 and 780 mm optical filters. TRW has provided additional engineering analysis, design, and manufacturing support, resulting in a robust, low cost, automated rendezvous and docking sensor design. We have addressed the issue of space qualification using off-the-shelf hardware components. We have also addressed the performance problems of increased signal to noise ratio, increased range, increased frame rate, graceful degradation through component redundancy, and improved range calibration. Next year, we will build a breadboard of this sensor. The phenomenology of the background scene of a target vehicle as viewed against earth and space backgrounds under various lighting conditions will be simulated using the TRW Dynamic Scene Generator Facility (DSGF). Solar illumination angles of the target vehicle and candidate docking target ranging from eclipse to full sun will be explored. The sensor will be transportable for testing at the MSFC Flight Robotics Laboratory (EB24) using the Dynamic Overhead Telerobotic Simulator (DOTS)

Evolution de la pauvreté urbaine en Côte d'Ivoire: Une analyse sur 15 ans d'enquêtes ménages

ABSTRACT: This article investigates the evolution of urban poverty in its various dimensions in Côte d'Ivoire since the 1980s. The robustness of the results is checked using dominance criteria. An econometric analysis of poverty complements the analysis. The study shows that the dynamic of poverty in terms of existence conditions can significantly differ from that of monetary poverty. As was the case in the 1980s, monetary poverty increased strongly in the 1990s in spite of a return to sustained growth following the devaluatio n of the CFA Franc. Poverty in terms of existence conditions rose less before the adjustment and even decreased afterwards.RESUME: L'objet de ce travail est d'étudier l'évolution de la pauvreté urbaine en Côte d'Ivoire depuis les années 1980. On s'attache à rendre compte de plusieurs dimensions de la pauvreté, à vérifier, par des techniques de la dominance, la robustesse des tendances observées et à estimer de manière économétrique les déterminants des différentes formes de pauvreté. On montre que la pauvreté de conditions d'existence peut adopter une dynamique différente de celle de la pauvreté monétaire. Sans équivoque, la pauvreté monétaire, après avoir véritablement explosé entre 1985 et 1993, a sensiblement augmenté dans les centres urbains ivoiriens malgré le retour de la croissance qui a suivi la dévaluation du Franc CFA. Une approche examinant les conditions d'existence et les capacités des ménages montre, sur la période de croissance, une tendance inverse. Bien que certains indicateurs de capacités des ménages tels que le niveau d'éducation aient connu des tendances de long terme positives, ils n'ont pu constituer un levier suffisant d'amélioration du niveau de vie monétaire

Aperiodic Ising Quantum Chains

Some years ago, Luck proposed a relevance criterion for the effect of aperiodic disorder on the critical behaviour of ferromagnetic Ising systems. In this article, we show how Luck's criterion can be derived within an exact renormalisation scheme for Ising quantum chains with coupling constants modulated according to substitution rules. Luck's conjectures for this case are confirmed and refined. Among other outcomes, we give an exact formula for the correlation length critical exponent for arbitrary two-letter substitution sequences with marginal fluctuations of the coupling constants.Comment: 27 pages, LaTeX, 1 Postscript figure included, using epsf.sty and amssymb.sty (one error corrected, some minor changes

Examination of the Anaerobic Growth of Campylobacter concisus

Campylobacter concisus is an oral bacterium that is associated with intestinal diseases. C. concisus was previously described as a bacterium that requires H2-enriched microaerobic conditions for growth. The level of H2 in the oral cavity is extremely low, suggesting that C. concisus is unlikely to have a microaerobic growth there. In this study, the anaerobic growth of C. concisus was investigated. The growth of fifty-seven oral C. concisus strains and six enteric C. concisus strains under various atmospheric conditions including anaerobic conditions with and without H2 was examined. The atmospheric conditions were generated using commercially available gas-generation systems. C. concisus putative virulence proteins were identified using mass spectrometry analysis. Under anaerobic conditions, 92% of the oral C. concisus strains (52/57) and all six enteric strains grew without the presence of H2 and the presence of H2 greatly increased C. concisus growth. An oral C. concisus strain was found to express a number of putative virulence proteins and the expression levels of these proteins were not affected by H2. The levels of H2 appeared to affect the optimal growth of C. concisus. This study provides useful information in understanding the natural colonization site and pathogenicity of C. concisus

Trapped-Ion Quantum Logic Utilizing Position-Dependent ac Stark Shifts

We present a scheme utilizing position-dependent ac Stark shifts for doing quantum logic with trapped ions. By a proper choice of direction, position and size, as well as power and frequency of a far-off-resonant Gaussian laser beam, specific ac Stark shifts can be assigned to the individual ions, making them distinguishable in frequency-space. In contrast to previous all-optical based quantum gates with trapped ions, the present scheme enables individual addressing of single ions and selective addressing of any pair of ions for two-ion quantum gates, without using tightly focused laser beams. Furthermore, the decoherence rate due to off-resonant excitations can be made negligible as compared with other sources of decoherence.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figures. Submitted to Physical Review Letter

Prevalence of Campylobacter Species in Adult Crohn's Disease and the Preferential Colonization Sites of Campylobacter Species in the Human Intestine

INTRODUCTION: Crohn's disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC) are the two major forms of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). A high prevalence of Campylobacter concisus was previously detected in paediatric CD and adult UC. Currently, the prevalence of C. concisus in adult CD and the preferential colonization sites of Campylobacter species in the human intestine are unknown. In this study, we examined the prevalence of Campylobacter species in biopsies collected from multiple anatomic sites of adult patients with IBD and controls. METHODS: Three hundred and one biopsies collected from ileum, caecum, descending colon and rectum of 28 patients IBD (15 CD and 13 UC) and 33 controls were studied. Biopsies were used for DNA extraction and detection of Campylobacter species by PCR-sequencing and Campylobacter cultivation. RESULTS: A significantly higher prevalence of C. concisus in colonic biopsies of patients with CD (53%) was detected as compared with the controls (18%). Campylobacter genus-PCR positivity and C. concisus positivity in patients with UC were 85% and 77% respectively, being significantly higher than that in the controls (48% and 36%). C. concisus was more often detected in descending colonic and rectal biopsies from patients with IBD in comparison to the controls. C. concisus was isolated from patients with IBD. CONCLUSION: The high intestinal prevalence of C. concisus in patients with IBD, particularly in the proximal large intestine, suggests that future studies are needed to investigate the possible involvement of C. concisus in a subgroup of human IBD. To our knowledge, this is the first report of the association between adult CD and C. concisus as well as the first study of the preferential colonization sites of C. concisus in the human intestine