Langley's DEVELOP Team Applies NASA's Earth Observations to Address Environmental Issues Across the Country and Around the Globe

The DEVELOP National Program was established over a decade ago to provide students with experience in the practical application of NASA Earth science research results. As part of NASA's Applied Sciences Program, DEVELOP focuses on bridging the gap between NASA technology and the public through projects that innovatively use NASA Earth science resources to address environmental issues. Cultivating a diverse and dynamic group of students and young professionals, the program conducts applied science research projects during three terms each year (spring, summer, and fall) that focus on topics ranging from water resource management to natural disasters

Pain intensity and attribution mediate the impact of patient weight and gender on activity recommendations for chronic pain

Background and purpose: Despite the notable benefits of physical activity for chronic pain, a large proportion of patients with chronic pain report that they do not receive activity-related recommendations from their providers. Research suggests that patient factors such as weight and gender influence activity-related recommendations for chronic pain. Research also suggests that appraisals of the intensity and cause of pain may explain these weight and gender effects. We investigated the influence of patient weight and gender on observers' likelihood of recommending activity-related treatments for pain. We also explored the mediating effects of observers' ratings of pain severity and the extent to which pain was due to medical and lifestyle factors (pain attribution). Patients and methods: Healthy young adults (N=616; 76% female) viewed videos (Ghent Pain Videos of Daily Activities) and vignettes of 4 patients with chronic back pain performing a standardized functional task. Patients varied by gender (female, male) and weight (normal, obese), but were otherwise equivalent on demographic characteristics and pain behaviors. Participants rated how much pain they perceived the patients to be experiencing, the extent to which they attributed the pain to medical and lifestyle factors, and their likelihood of recommending exercise, physical therapy (PT), and rest. Results: Patient weight and gender significantly interacted to influence exercise, PT, and rest recommendations. Both pain intensity and pain attribution mediated the relationships between patient weight and activity recommendations; however, these mediation effects differed across gender and recommendation type. Conclusion: Patient weight and gender influenced laypeople's activity recommendations for chronic pain. Moreover, the results suggest that observers' perceptions of pain intensity and pain attributions are mechanisms underlying these effects. If these findings are replicated in providers, interventions may need to be developed to reduce provider biases and increase their recognition of the benefits of physical activity for chronic pain

Capoeiristas: dancing between identities

Due to the character of the original source materials and the nature of batch digitization, quality control issues may be present in this document. Please report any quality issues you encounter to [email protected], referencing the URI of the item.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 39-41).Capoeira is an Afro-Brazilian martial art that is believed to have developed as a method of resistance for slaves in Brazil. Out of fear of their slaves' defensive abilities, this street fighting was outlawed. As a result, the slaves played music to accompany their fights disguising it as dance and thus, capoeira was born. True to the field of anthropology, I conducted an ethnographic study on two capoeirista groups in Austin. Capoeira is divided into two styles, regional and Angola; my study will focus primarily on capoeira Angola. Library research on capoeira revealed a strong connection between the art's practitioners and its African heritage. Therefore, I was surprised to find the classes I attended to be comprised of predominately white middle-class students. I also observed that the two groups I was interacting with exhibited very different characteristics and theoretical orientations in relation to training procedures. Consequently, I began to examine the process of identity formation. First, I defined identity as the psychological packages of qualities exhibited, endorsed and valued by the subject. My next task was to postulate hypotheses to explain the attraction of non-Africans to such an ethnic art. I formulated five different hypotheses including identification with a romantically un-rooted lifestyle, a rejection of Western society's superficial dichotomies, a quest for a new culture to rally around due to a sense of nonconformity with general "American" culture, a search for a community network, and finally, a search for something new and exotic. I found the emic, native, point of view to best support the search for a community network hypothesis. However, my etic view, the outsider's opinion, has discerned something deeper that holds these people together. My empirical evidence best supports the ideas that one of my contact groups falls into the search for something new and exotic hypothesis, but the other group falls into the quest for an alternative culture category. This research has also had a profound effect on me personally, especially due to my experiences as a dancer. This study, I hope, will be expanded in order to test the applicability of my hypotheses to the capoeira culture at large

Thriving for Individuals with Disabilities: Towards a Collective Model in Midland County, Michigan

Midland County, Michigan, is a progressive community in which positive psychology contributes to the flourishing of its citizens. They have formed a Steering Committee consisting of numerous organizations that serve people living with disabilities. The purpose of this project was to develop a collective model of success for individuals with disabilities that would enable agencies supporting this population to effectively partner and build flourishing for this community. This project identified four key pillars that support thriving for individuals with disabilities: character strengths, self-determination, mattering, and belonging. Through a series of 15-minute workshops facilitated by a Steering Committee member, they will understand the construct of each pillar, have the opportunity to practice specific interventions in their personal and professional lives, and develop ways to implement the key concepts within their agencies to serve the individuals with disabilities

Nitrogen uptake strategies of edaphically specialized Bornean tree species

The association of tree species with particular soil types contributes to high b diversity in forests, but the mechanisms producing such distributions are still debated. Soil nitrogen (N) often limits growth and occurs in differentially available chemical forms. In a Bornean forest where tree species composition changes dramatically along a soil gradient varying in supplies of different N-forms, we investigated whether tree species’ N-uptake and soil specialization strategies covaried. We analyzed foliar 15N natural abundance for a total of 216 tree species on clay or sandy loam (the soils at the gradient’s extremes) and conducted a 15N-tracer experiment with nine specialist and generalist species to test whether species displayed flexible or differential uptake of ammonium and nitrate. Despite variation in ammonium and nitrate supplies and nearly 4 % difference in foliar δ15N between most soil specialists and populations of generalists on these soils, our 15N tracer experiment showed little support for the hypothesis that soil specialists vary in N-form use or the ratios in which they use these forms. Instead, our results indicate that these species possess flexible capacities to take up different inorganic N forms. Variation between soil specialists in uptake of different N forms is thus unlikely to cause the soil associations of tree species and high b diversity characteristic of this Bornean rain forest. Flexible uptake strategies would facilitate N-acquisition when supply rates of N-forms exhibit spatiotemporal variation and suggest that these species may be functionally redundant in their responses to N gradients and influences on ecosystem N-cycles

Assessment of the Validity of Reported Antibiotic Allergic Reactions in Pediatric Patients

Study Objective. To determine whether a reported antibiotic allergy was likely to have been immunologically mediated. Design. Questionnaire-based study. Setting. Tertiary care, freestanding children\u27s hospital. Patients. One hundred patients aged 1 month-18 years for whom guardians reported an allergy to an antibiotic at the time of hospital admission between October 2009 and March 2010. Intervention. Guardians of the patients were interviewed by using a standardized allergy assessment questionnaire. Measurements and Main Results. Based on answers to the questionnaire, the reported allergic reactions were categorized to determine if they were true allergies or adverse reactions. Among the 100 patients, reported allergies were categorized as immunologically mediated reactions in 58%, non-immunologically mediated adverse drug reactions in 27%, no reaction in 3%, and unknown in 12%. Reactions to penicillins, cephalosporins, or sulfonamides were reported most frequently and were attributed to immunologically mediated reactions in 68% (26/38), 74% (17/23), and 67% (10/15) of instances, respectively. Conclusion. Use of the allergy assessment questionnaire determined that 58% of the 100 reported antibiotic allergies fulfilled criteria for an immunologically mediated reaction. These findings underscore the utility of an allergy assessment questionnaire, versus a simple drug history, in improving the accuracy of reported antibiotic reactions

A Case of Metastatic Atypical Neuroendocrine Tumor with ALK Translocation and Diffuse Brain Metastases.

A challenge in precision medicine requires identification of actionable driver mutations. Critical to such effort is the deployment of sensitive and well-validated assays for mutation detection. Although identification of such alterations within the tumor tissue remains the gold standard, many advanced non-small cell lung cancer cases have only limited tissue samples, derived from small biopsies or fine-needle aspirates, available for testing. More recently, noninvasive methods using either circulating tumor cells or tumor DNA (ctDNA) have become an alternative method for identifying molecular biomarkers and screening patients eligible for targeted therapies. In this article, we present a case of a 52-year-old never-smoking male who presented with widely metastatic atypical neuroendocrine tumor to the bones and the brain. Molecular genotyping using DNA harvested from a bone metastasis was unsuccessful due to limited material. Subsequent ctDNA analysis revealed an ALK translocation. The clinical significance of the mutation in this particular cancer type and therapeutic strategies are discussed.Key pointsTo our knowledge, this index case represents the first reported ALK translocation identified in an atypical carcinoid tumor.Liquid biopsy such as circulating tumor DNA is a feasible alternative platform for identifying sensitizing genomic alterations.Second-generation ALK inhibitors represent a new paradigm for treating ALK-positive patients with brain metastases

College completion predicts lower depression but higher metabolic syndrome among disadvantaged minorities in young adulthood

College graduates enjoy healthier, longer lives compared with individuals who do not graduate from college. However, the health benefit of educational attainment is not as great for blacks as it is for whites. Moreover, college completion may not erase the detrimental effects of early-life disadvantage for blacks and Hispanics. We use nationally representative data on young adults to test whether American minorities experience differential returns to educational attainment. We find that college completion predicts lower rates of depression for all racial groups. It also predicts lower metabolic syndrome among whites. However, college completion predicts higher metabolic syndrome among black and Hispanic adults from disadvantaged backgrounds, suggesting upward mobility may come at a health cost to young minorities in America

Impact of Multi-Night Experimentally Induced Short Sleep on Adolescent Performance in a Simulated Classroom

Study Objectives: Investigate whether a realistic "dose" of shortened sleep, relative to a well-rested state, causes a decline in adolescents' learning and an increase in inattentive and sleepy behaviors in a simulated classroom setting. Methods: Eighty-seven healthy 14.0- to 16.9-year olds underwent a 3-week sleep manipulation protocol, including two 5-night sleep manipulation conditions presented in a randomly counterbalanced within-subjects cross-over design. Wake time was held constant. Bedtimes were set to induce Short Sleep (SS; 6.5 hours in bed) versus Healthy Sleep (HS; 10 hours in bed). During the morning at the end of each condition, participants underwent a simulated classroom procedure in which they viewed lecture-based educational videotapes and completed relevant quizzes. Their behaviors in the simulated classroom were later coded by condition-blind raters for evidence of inattention and sleepiness. Results: Adolescents had a longer average sleep period during HS (9.1 hours) than SS (6.5 hours). Compared to scores during HS, adolescents scored significantly lower on the quiz, showed more behaviors suggestive of inattention and sleepiness in the simulated classroom, and were reported by adolescents themselves and by their parents to be more inattentive and sleepy during SS. However, the impact of the manipulation on quiz scores was not mediated by changes in attention or sleepiness. Conclusions: Although effect sizes were modest, these findings suggest that previously-reported correlations between sleep duration and academic performance reflect true cause-effect relationships. Findings add to the growing evidence that the chronically shortened sleep experienced by many adolescents on school nights adversely impacts their functioning and health

Maternal B vitamins: effects on offspring weight and DNA methylation at genomically imprinted domains

Abstract Background Inadequate maternal nutrition during early fetal development can create permanent alterations in the offspring, leading to poor health outcomes. While nutrients involved in one-carbon cycle metabolism are important to fetal growth, associations with specific nutrients remain inconsistent. This study estimates associations between maternal vitamins B12, B6 (pyridoxal phosphate [PLP] and 4-pyridoxic acid [PA]), and homocysteine (Hcy) concentrations, offspring weight (birth weight and 3-year weight gain), and DNA methylation at four differentially methylated regions (DMRs) known to be involved in fetal growth and development (H19, MEG3, SGCE/PEG10, and PLAGL1). Methods Study participants (n = 496) with biomarker and birth weight data were enrolled as part of the Newborn Epigenetics STudy. Weight gain data were available for 273 offspring. Among 484 mother-infant pairs, DNA methylation at regulatory sequences of genomically imprinted genes was measured in umbilical cord blood DNA using bisulfite pyrosequencing. We used generalized linear models to estimate associations. Results Multivariate adjusted regression models revealed an inverse association between maternal Hcy concentration and male birth weight (β = −210.40, standard error (SE) = 102.08, p = 0.04). The offspring of the mothers in the highest quartile of B12 experienced lower weight gain between birth and 3 years compared to the offspring of the mothers in the lowest (β = −2203.03, SE = 722.49, p = 0.003). Conversely, maternal PLP was associated with higher weight gain in males; higher maternal PLP concentrations were also associated with offspring DNA methylation levels at the MEG3 DMR (p < 0.01). Conclusions While maternal concentrations of B12, B6, and Hcy do not associate with birth weight overall, they may play an important role in 3-year weight gain. This is the first study to report an association between maternal PLP and methylation at the MEG3 DMR which may be an important epigenetic tag for maternal B vitamin adequacy