Self reported aggravating activities do not demonstrate a consistent directional pattern in chronic non specific low back pain patients: An observational study

Question: Do the self-reported aggravating activities of chronic non-specific low back pain patients demonstrate a consistent directional pattern? Design: Cross-sectional observational study. Participants: 240 chronic non specific low back pain patients. Outcome measure: We invited experienced clinicians to classify each of the three self-nominated aggravating activities from the Patient Specific Functional Scale by the direction of lumbar spine movement. Patients were described as demonstrating a directional pattern if all nominated activities moved the spine into the same direction. Analyses were undertaken to determine if the proportion of patients demonstrating a directional pattern was greater than would be expected by chance. Results: In some patients, all tasks did move the spine into the same direction, but this proportion did not differ from chance (p = 0.328). There were no clinical or demographic differences between those who displayed a directional pattern and those who did not (all p > 0.05). Conclusion: Using patient self-reported aggravating activities we were unable to demonstrate the existence of a consistent pattern of adverse movement in patients with chronic non-specific low back pain

Disentanglement and Decoherence without dissipation at non-zero temperatures

Decoherence is well understood, in contrast to disentanglement. According to common lore, irreversible coupling to a dissipative environment is the mechanism for loss of entanglement. Here, we show that, on the contrary, disentanglement can in fact occur at large enough temperatures $T$ even for vanishingly small dissipation (as we have shown previously for decoherence). However, whereas the effect of $T$ on decoherence increases exponentially with time, the effect of $T$ on disentanglement is constant for all times, reflecting a fundamental difference between the two phenomena. Also, the possibility of disentanglement at a particular $T$ increases with decreasing initial entanglement.Comment: 3 page

Diversity of gut microflora is required for the generation of B cell with regulatory properties in a skin graft model

B cells have been reported to promote graft rejection through alloantibody production. However, there is growing evidence that B cells can contribute to the maintenance of tolerance. Here, we used a mouse model of MHC-class I mismatched skin transplantation to investigate the contribution of B cells to graft survival. We demonstrate that adoptive transfer of B cells prolongs skin graft survival but only when the B cells were isolated from mice housed in low sterility "conventional" (CV) facilities and not from mice housed in pathogen free facilities (SPF). However, prolongation of skin graft survival was lost when B cells were isolated from IL-10 deficient mice housed in CV facilities. The suppressive function of B cells isolated from mice housed in CV facilities correlated with an anti-inflammatory environment and with the presence of a different gut microflora compared to mice maintained in SPF facilities. Treatment of mice in the CV facility with antibiotics abrogated the regulatory capacity of B cells. Finally, we identified transitional B cells isolated from CV facilities as possessing the regulatory function. These findings demonstrate that B cells, and in particular transitional B cells, can promote prolongation of graft survival, a function dependent on licensing by gut microflora

Pig producer perspectives on the use of meat inspection as an animal health and welfare diagnostic tool in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland

peer-reviewedBackground Currently, there is growing interest in developing ante and post mortem meat inspection (MI) to incorporate measures of pig health and welfare for use as a diagnostic tool on pig farms. However, the success of the development of the MI process requires stakeholder engagement with the process. Knowledge gaps and issues of trust can undermine the effective exchange and utilisation of information across the supply chain. A social science research methodology was employed to establish stakeholder perspectives towards the development of MI to include measures of pig health and welfare. In this paper the findings of semi-structured telephone interviews with 18 pig producers from the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland are presented. Results Producers recognised the benefit of the utilisation of MI data as a health and welfare diagnostic tool. This acknowledgment, however, was undermined for some by dissatisfaction with the current system of MI information feedback, by trust and fairness concerns, and by concerns regarding the extent to which data would be used in the producers’ interests. Tolerance of certain animal welfare issues may also have a negative impact on how producers viewed the potential of MI data. The private veterinary practitioner was viewed as playing a vital role in assisting them with the interpretation of MI data for herd health planning. Conclusions The development of positive relationships based on trust, commitment and satisfaction across the supply chain may help build a positive environment for the effective utilisation of MI data in improving pig health and welfare. The utilisation of MI as a diagnostic tool would benefit from the development of a communication strategy aimed at building positive relationships between stakeholders in the pig industry.The authors acknowledge the financial support provided by the Irish Government’s National Development Plan 2007–2013 (Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine’s Competitive Research Programme – RSF 11/S/107)

Initial correlations effects on decoherence at zero temperature

We consider a free charged particle interacting with an electromagnetic bath at zero temperature. The dipole approximation is used to treat the bath wavelengths larger than the width of the particle wave packet. The effect of these wavelengths is described then by a linear Hamiltonian whose form is analogous to phenomenological Hamiltonians previously adopted to describe the free particle-bath interaction. We study how the time dependence of decoherence evolution is related with initial particle-bath correlations. We show that decoherence is related to the time dependent dressing of the particle. Moreover because decoherence induced by the T=0 bath is very rapid, we make some considerations on the conditions under which interference may be experimentally observed.Comment: 16 pages, 1 figur

Cervicitis as a Clinical Indicator of Gonococcal and Chlamydial Infections in Pregnancy

Objective: We undertook the present study to attempt to apply clinical indicators predictive of cervical infection in nongravid populations with either Neisseria gonorrhoeae or Chlamydia trachomatis to our pregnant population and to determine the significance of the clinical diagnosis of “cervicitis.

Reply to Comment on "Completely positive quantum dissipation"

This is the reply to a Comment by R. F. O'Connell (Phys. Rev. Lett. 87 (2001) 028901) on a paper written by the author (B. Vacchini, ``Completely positive quantum dissipation'', Phys.Rev.Lett. 84 (2000) 1374, arXiv:quant-ph/0002094).Comment: 2 pages, revtex, no figure