In-situ, time resolved monitoring of uranium in BFS:OPC grout. Part 1: Corrosion in water vapour

Uranium encapsulated in grout was exposed to water vapour for extended periods of time. Through synchrotron x-ray powder difraction and tomography measurements, uranium dioxide was determined the dominant corrosion product over a 50-week time period. The oxide growth rate initiated rapidly, with rates comparable to the U+H2O reaction. Over time, the reaction rate decreased and eventually plateaued to a rate similar to the U+H2O+O2 reaction. This behaviour was not attributed to oxygen ingress, but instead the decreasing permeability of the grout, limiting oxidising species access to the metal surface

The Holocene isotopic record of aquatic cellulose from Lake Äntu Sinijärv, Estonia: Influence of changing climate and organic-matter sources

The well characterized oxygen-isotopic fractionation during cellulose biosynthesis has been utilised by numerous studies of stable isotopes in fine-grained aquatic cellulose. We measured the δ13Ccelluloseand δ18Ocellulosevalues of bulk cellulose and moss fragments from an ∼11.4ka-long core obtained from a shallow, productive, spring-fed, hardwater lake, Äntu Sinijärv, Estonia (59˚3.8′N; 26˚14.5′E; 94.6 m a.s.l.; maximum depth 7.3 m), in order to reconstruct regional Holocene climate and lake-basin evolution. Isotopically, the modern waterbody is a well-behaved, open, hydrological system with negligible evaporative effects. Cellulose-isotope records were compared with down-core measurements of loss-on-ignition (LOI), carbonate and mineral contents, total organic carbon (TOC), total nitrogen (TN), C/N ratio, δ13CTOC, biomarker indices (Palgand Paq), published palaeoecological data and a δ18Ocarbonaterecord from the same palaeolake. Green microalgae, freshwater macroalgae (Chara) and aquatic bryophytes were important sources of sedimentary cellulose during different phases in the environmental history of the lake. Although a strong palaeoclimatic imprint can be detected in the δ18Ocelluloserecord from Äntu Sinijärv, notably the Preboreal oscillation, the 8.2ka event and an unnamed cold oscillation ∼3.25ka BP, the isotopic signal of these events may have been amplified by increases in18O-depleted spring snowmelt. In contrast, δ13Ccellulosewas tightly coupled to the Holocene evolution of terrestrial ecosystems and soils by significant inputs of biogenic carbon from the catchment and sublacustrine springs. During the early Holocene, ∼11 – 9ka BP, the δ18Ocelluloseand δ18Ocarbonaterecords diverge markedly, which can be attributed to “no-analogue” seasonal, climatic, hydrological and isotopic conditions resulting from orbital forcing and residual ice-sheet impacts

Preference Elicitation Techniques Used in Valuing Children's Health-Related Quality-of-Life: A Systematic Review.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVES: Valuing children's health states for use in economic evaluations is globally relevant and is of particular relevance in jurisdictions where a cost-utility analysis is the preferred form of analysis for decision making. Despite this, the challenges with valuing child health mean that there are many remaining questions for debate about the approach to elicitation of values. The aim of this paper was to identify and describe the methods used to value children's health states and the specific issues that arise in the use of these methods. METHODS: We conducted a systematic search of electronic databases to identify studies published in English since 1990 that used preference elicitation methods to value child and adolescent (under 18 years of age) health states. Eligibility criteria comprised valuation studies concerning both child-specific patient-reported outcome measures and child health states defined in other ways, and methodological studies of valuation approaches that may or may not have yielded a value set algorithm. RESULTS: A total of 77 eligible studies were identified from which data on country setting, aims, condition (general population or clinically specific), sample size, age of respondents, the perspective that participants were asked to adopt, source of values (respondents who completed the preference elicitation tasks) and methods questions asked were extracted. Extracted data were classified and evaluated using narrative synthesis methods. The studies were classified into three groups: (1) studies comparing elicitation methods (n = 30); (2) studies comparing perspectives (n = 23); and (3) studies where no comparisons were presented (n = 26); selected studies could fall into more than one group. Overall, the studies varied considerably both in methods used and in reporting. The preference elicitation tasks included time trade-off, standard gamble, visual analogue scaling, rating/ranking, discrete choice experiments, best-worst scaling and willingness to pay elicited through a contingent valuation. Perspectives included adults' considering the health states from their own perspective, adults taking the perspective of a child (own, other, hypothetical) and a child/adolescent taking their own or the perspective of another child. There was some evidence that children gave lower values for comparable health states than did adults that adopted their own perspective or adult/parents that adopted the perspective of children. CONCLUSIONS: Differences in reporting limited the conclusions that can be formed about which methods are most suitable for eliciting preferences for children's health and the influence of differing perspectives and values. Difficulties encountered in drawing conclusions from the data (such as lack of consensus and poor reporting making it difficult for users to choose and interpret available values) suggest that reporting guidelines are required to improve the consistency and quality of reporting of studies that value children's health using preference-based techniques

Agalsidase beta treatment is associated with improved quality of life in patients with Fabry disease: Findings from the Fabry Registry

Purpose: To evaluate the effect of agalsidase beta on longitudinal health-related quality of life in patients with Fabry disease. Methods: the SF-36 (R) Health Survey was used to measure health-related quality of life in Fabry Registry patients. Seventy-one men and 59 women who were treated with agalsidase beta (median dose: 1.0 mg/kg/2 weeks) and who had baseline and at least 2 yearly posttreatment health-related quality of life measurements were included in these analyses. A repeated measures model was used to analyze change in score from baseline. Results: Men improved in the physical component summary and in all eight scales of the SF-36 after 1 and 2 years and in the mental component summary after 1 year of agalsidase beta treatment (P < 0.05). Women improved in the mental component summary and in six of the eight scales after 1 and/or 2 years of treatment. Patients whose baseline SF-36 scores were below the median showed the greatest improvements. These responses were comparable with or greater than the published effects of various treatments for multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis, central neuropathic pain, and Gaucher disease. Conclusion: Long-term treatment with agalsidase beta resulted in substantial improvements in health-related quality of life in both men and women; the effect was more pronounced in men. Genet Med 2010:12(11):703 712.Genzyme CorporationGenzymeNatl Univ Hosp, Dept Endocrinol, DK-2100 Copenhagen, DenmarkSan Bassano Hosp, Dept Neurol, Bassano Del Grappa, ItalyUniv Padua, Dept Neurosci, Padua, ItalyUniv Wurzburg, Dept Med, Wurzburg, GermanyColumbia Univ, Dept Pediat, Div Clin Genet, Coll Phys & Surg, New York, NY 10027 USACincinnati Childrens Hosp, Div Human Genet, Cincinnati, OH USAUniversidade Federal de São Paulo, Inatos Metab CREIM, São Paulo, BrazilMassachusetts Gen Hosp, Dept Neurol, Boston, MA 02114 USAGenzyme Corp, Dept Biomed Data Sci & Informat, Cambridge, MA USAUniversidade Federal de São Paulo, Inatos Metab CREIM, São Paulo, BrazilWeb of Scienc

Leadership = Communication? The relations of leaders' communication styles with leadership styles, knowledge sharing and leadership outcomes

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to investigate the relations between leaders' communication styles and charismatic leadership, human-oriented leadership (leader's consideration), task-oriented leadership (leader's initiating structure), and leadership outcomes. Methodology: A survey was conducted among 279 employees of a governmental organization. The following six main communication styles were operationalized: verbal aggressiveness, expressiveness, preciseness, assuredness, supportiveness, and argumentativeness. Regression analyses were employed to test three main hypotheses. Findings: In line with expectations, the study showed that charismatic and human-oriented leadership are mainly communicative, while task-oriented leadership is significantly less communicative. The communication styles were strongly and differentially related to knowledge sharing behaviors, perceived leader performance, satisfaction with the leader, and subordinate's team commitment. Multiple regression analyses showed that the leadership styles mediated the relations between the communication styles and leadership outcomes. However, leader's preciseness explained variance in perceived leader performance and satisfaction with the leader above and beyond the leadership style variables. Implications: This study offers potentially invaluable input for leadership training programs by showing the importance of leader's supportiveness, assuredness, and preciseness when communicating with subordinates. Originality/value: Although one of the core elements of leadership is interpersonal communication, this study is one of the first to use a comprehensive communication styles instrument in the study of leadership. © 2009 The Author(s)

Identification of GBV-D, a Novel GB-like Flavivirus from Old World Frugivorous Bats (Pteropus giganteus) in Bangladesh

Bats are reservoirs for a wide range of zoonotic agents including lyssa-, henipah-, SARS-like corona-, Marburg-, Ebola-, and astroviruses. In an effort to survey for the presence of other infectious agents, known and unknown, we screened sera from 16 Pteropus giganteus bats from Faridpur, Bangladesh, using high-throughput pyrosequencing. Sequence analyses indicated the presence of a previously undescribed virus that has approximately 50% identity at the amino acid level to GB virus A and C (GBV-A and -C). Viral nucleic acid was present in 5 of 98 sera (5%) from a single colony of free-ranging bats. Infection was not associated with evidence of hepatitis or hepatic dysfunction. Phylogenetic analysis indicates that this first GBV-like flavivirus reported in bats constitutes a distinct species within the Flaviviridae family and is ancestral to the GBV-A and -C virus clades

Summer warming explains widespread but not uniform greening in the Arctic tundra biome

Arctic warming can influence tundra ecosystem function with consequences for climate feedbacks, wildlife and human communities. Yet ecological change across the Arctic tundra biome remains poorly quantified due to field measurement limitations and reliance on coarse-resolution satellite data. Here, we assess decadal changes in Arctic tundra greenness using time series from the 30 m resolution Landsat satellites. From 1985 to 2016 tundra greenness increased (greening) at ~37.3% of sampling sites and decreased (browning) at ~4.7% of sampling sites. Greening occurred most often at warm sampling sites with increased summer air temperature, soil temperature, and soil moisture, while browning occurred most often at cold sampling sites that cooled and dried. Tundra greenness was positively correlated with graminoid, shrub, and ecosystem productivity measured at field sites. Our results support the hypothesis that summer warming stimulated plant productivity across much, but not all, of the Arctic tundra biome during recent decades

Human monoclonal antibodies targeting carbonic anhydrase IX for the molecular imaging of hypoxic regions in solid tumours

BACKGROUND: Hypoxia, which is commonly observed in areas of primary tumours and of metastases, influences response to treatment. However, its characterisation has so far mainly been restricted to the ex vivo analysis of tumour sections using monoclonal antibodies specific to carbonic anhydrase IX (CA IX) or by pimonidazole staining, after the intravenous administration of this 2-nitroimidazole compound in experimental animal models.METHODS: In this study, we describe the generation of high-affinity human monoclonal antibodies (A3 and CC7) specific to human CA IX, using phage technology.RESULTS: These antibodies were able to stain CA IX ex vivo and to target the cognate antigen in vivo. In one of the two animal models of colorectal cancer studied (LS174T), CA IX imaging closely matched pimonidazole staining, with a preferential staining of tumour areas characterised by little vascularity and low perfusion. In contrast, in a second animal model (SW1222), distinct staining patterns were observed for pimonidazole and CA IX targeting. We observed a complementary pattern of tumour regions targeted in vivo by the clinical-stage vascular-targeting antibody L19 and the anti-CA IX antibody A3, indicating that a homogenous pattern of in vivo tumour targeting could be achieved by a combination of the two antibodies.CONCLUSION: The new human anti-CA IX antibodies are expected to be non-immunogenic in patients with cancer and may serve as broadly applicable reagents for the non-invasive imaging of hypoxia and for pharmacodelivery applications. British Journal of Cancer (2009) 101, 645-657. doi: 10.1038/sj.bjc.6605200 www.bjcancer.com Published online 21 July 2009 (C) 2009 Cancer Research U