Women’s perceptions of pharmacist‐prescribed hormonal contraception

IntroductionUnintended pregnancy is a public health issue, with young women in their late teens and early 20s at highest risk. Multiple approaches to increasing contraception access have been implemented, including adoption of statewide pharmacist prescribing legislation in multiple states. Indiana does not currently have such legislation in place. The objective of this study was to identify how women at risk for unintended pregnancy in central Indiana perceive pharmacist prescribing of contraception.Study DesignQualitative, one‐on‐one semi‐structured interviews.MethodsPurposive, convenience sampling of eligible women 18 to 29‐years‐old who live in Indiana was used. Recruitment occurred via printed flyers placed in public locations that were not focused on health care, free classified online advertisements, and electronic flyers within Facebook social groups relevant to the study population. Interviews were conducted via telephone until thematic saturation was achieved. Participant demographics, baseline characteristics, current and past barriers to obtaining contraception, and perception of a pharmacist contraception prescribing model were collected. Interview transcripts were coded in an iterative manner with qualitative data analysis software (MAXQDA, Version 12) until consensus was achieved.ResultsFourteen women completed the study. Four primary themes emerged encompassing accessibility, communication, pharmacist attributes, and payment. Thirteen participants would personally utilize a pharmacist prescribing contraceptive service and all stated that this service would be beneficial for other women. Of those women expressing a preference (n = 7), a female pharmacist would be preferred for service delivery. Participants expressed concerns related to access by minors, skills and training of the pharmacist, and environment within the pharmacy.ConclusionsWomen in Indiana desire broader access to contraception. Efforts should be made at the individual pharmacist‐provider level and statewide to explore strategies to increase access. Resources should be allocated to the creation of protocols for pharmacist prescribing within Indiana and other states.Peer Reviewedhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/154257/1/jac51169.pdfhttps://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/154257/2/jac51169_am.pd

Monte-Carlo simulation of neutron transmission through nanocomposite materials for neutron-optics applications

Nanocomposites enable us to tune parameters that are crucial for use of such materials for neutron-optics applications such as diffraction gratings by careful choice of properties such as species (isotope) and concentration of contained nanoparticles. Nanocomposites for neutron optics have so far successfully been deployed in protonated form, containing high amounts of $^1$H atoms, which exhibit rather strong neutron absorption and incoherent scattering. At a future stage of development, chemicals containing $^1$H could be replaced by components with more favourable isotopes, such as $^2$H or $^{19}$F. In this note, we present results of Monte-Carlo simulations of the transmissivity of various nanocomposite materials for thermal and very-cold neutron spectra. The results are compared to experimental transmission data. Our simulation results for deuterated and fluorinated nanocomposite materials predict a decrease of absorption- and scattering-losses down to about 2 % for very-cold neutrons.Comment: submitted to NIM

Climate-modulated range expansion of reef-building coral communities off southeast Florida during the late Holocene

The Holocene reefs off southeast Florida provide unique insights into the biogeographical and ecological response of western Atlantic coral reefs to past climate change that can be used to evaluate future climate impacts. However, previous studies have focused on millennial-scale change during the stable mid-Holocene, making it difficult to make inferences about the impact of shorter-term variability that is relevant to modern climate warming. Using uranium-series dating of newly discovered subfossil coral rubble deposits, we establish a new high-resolution record of coral community development off southeast Florida during a period of variable climate in the late Holocene. Our results indicate that coral communities dominated by reef-building Acropora palmata and Orbicella spp. persisted in the nearshore environments off southeast Florida ~75 km north of their primary historical ranges between ~3500 and 1800 years before present. This timing coincides with regional warming at the northern extent of the Atlantic Warm Pool, suggesting a likely link between regional oceanographic climate and the expansion of cold-sensitive reef-building coral communities to the high-latitude reefs off southeast Florida. These findings not only extend the record of coral-reef development in southeast Florida into the late Holocene, but they also have important implications for future range expansions of reef-building coral communities in response to modern climate change

A theory of L1L^1-dissipative solvers for scalar conservation laws with discontinuous flux

We propose a general framework for the study of $L^1$ contractive semigroups of solutions to conservation laws with discontinuous flux. Developing the ideas of a number of preceding works we claim that the whole admissibility issue is reduced to the selection of a family of "elementary solutions", which are certain piecewise constant stationary weak solutions. We refer to such a family as a "germ". It is well known that (CL) admits many different $L^1$ contractive semigroups, some of which reflects different physical applications. We revisit a number of the existing admissibility (or entropy) conditions and identify the germs that underly these conditions. We devote specific attention to the anishing viscosity" germ, which is a way to express the "$\Gamma$-condition" of Diehl. For any given germ, we formulate "germ-based" admissibility conditions in the form of a trace condition on the flux discontinuity line $x=0$ (in the spirit of Vol'pert) and in the form of a family of global entropy inequalities (following Kruzhkov and Carrillo). We characterize those germs that lead to the $L^1$-contraction property for the associated admissible solutions. Our approach offers a streamlined and unifying perspective on many of the known entropy conditions, making it possible to recover earlier uniqueness results under weaker conditions than before, and to provide new results for other less studied problems. Several strategies for proving the existence of admissible solutions are discussed, and existence results are given for fluxes satisfying some additional conditions. These are based on convergence results either for the vanishing viscosity method (with standard viscosity or with specific viscosities "adapted" to the choice of a germ), or for specific germ-adapted finite volume schemes

Patterning of 2D second harmonic generation active arrays in ferroelectric nematic fluids.

Ferroelectric nematic liquid crystals exhibit unique non-linear optical properties, with the potential to become transformative materials for photonic applications. A promising direction relies on the fabrication of tailored polar orientational patterns via photoalignment, thus shaping the non-linear optical susceptibility through thin slabs of the ferroelectric fluid. Here, we explore the fabrication of 2D periodic SHG active arrays in ferroelectric nematic fluids, for different materials, cell thicknesses and motifs. Based on polarizing optical microscopy observations in combination with optical simulations, second harmonic generation microscopy and interferometry, the 3D structure of the motifs is revealed. Two different 2D periodic patterns are explored, showing that the balance between flexoelectric and electrostatic energy can lead to different domain structures, an effect which is rooted in the difference between the flexoelectric properties of the materials. It is shown that by combining the surface-inscribed alignment with different spontaneous degrees of twist, 2D SHG active arrays can be obtained in the micrometre scale, in which adjacent areas exhibit maximum SHG signals at opposite angles

Modelling human choices: MADeM and decision‑making

Research supported by FAPESP 2015/50122-0 and DFG-GRTK 1740/2. RP and AR are also part of the Research, Innovation and Dissemination Center for Neuromathematics FAPESP grant (2013/07699-0). RP is supported by a FAPESP scholarship (2013/25667-8). ACR is partially supported by a CNPq fellowship (grant 306251/2014-0)

Noradrenaline Increases the Expression of the Proenkephalin Gene in Cultured Astroglial Cells by Acting on β1- and α1-Adrenoceptors

In primary culture, type I astroglial cells from neocortex of newborn rats express the proenkephalin gene. The glial cells are not homogeneous but differ in their morphology; i.e., polygonal and process‐bearing cells are found. Transcription of the proenkephalin gene is increased via protein kinase A upon stimulation with cyclic AMP (cAMP) analogues. In the present study, how noradrenaline affected the expression of the proenkephalin gene in both cell types was investigated. Noradrenaline enhanced the levels of proenkephalin mRNA in a concentration‐dependent manner. Experiments with subtype‐selective antagonists suggested that β1‐adrenoceptors were involved. In situ hybridization showed that proenkephalin mRNA was induced only in polygonal cells. Noradrenaline also increased the levels of cAMP. However, concentrations of noradrenaline that produced a maximal increase in cAMP caused only submaximal elevations of proenkephalin mRNA. This discrepancy was explained by the finding that noradrenaline increased the expression of the proenkephalin gene also via α1‐adrenoceptors. It is concluded that β1‐ and α1‐adrenoceptors can act in a synergistic manner on the expression of the proenkephalin gene in astroglial cells

Fluctuations of cell geometry and their non-equilibrium thermodynamics in living epithelial tissue

We introduce a measure of the entropy production in a living functional epithelial tissue. We do this by extracting the functional dynamics of development while at the same time quantifying fluctuations. Using the translucent Drosophila melanogaster pupal epithelium as an ideal tissue for high resolution live imaging, we find surprisingly, irreversible dynamics without entropy production. This is done using a detailed analysis of the dynamics of the shape and orientation of individual cells which enables separation of local and global aspects of the tissue behaviour

Correlation between structural properties and iridescent colors of cellulose nanocrystalline films

We investigate the effect of shear flow applied during the drying of aqueous suspension of cellulose nanocrystals on optical reflective properties and structural characteristics of the resulting solidified films. Shear flow can significantly improve internal structural homogeneity of the films, while its effect on optical reflective properties is relatively minor. The measured width of the selective reflection peak is an order of magnitude larger than expected for an ideal helically modulated structure, which reflects a distribution of pitch values and possibly also of regimes of distorted helical modulation. We attribute these imperfections to the broad size distribution of the cellulose nanocrystals

DataSheet_1_Climate-modulated range expansion of reef-building coral communities off southeast Florida during the late Holocene.docx

The Holocene reefs off southeast Florida provide unique insights into the biogeographical and ecological response of western Atlantic coral reefs to past climate change that can be used to evaluate future climate impacts. However, previous studies have focused on millennial-scale change during the stable mid-Holocene, making it difficult to make inferences about the impact of shorter-term variability that is relevant to modern climate warming. Using uranium-series dating of newly discovered subfossil coral rubble deposits, we establish a new high-resolution record of coral community development off southeast Florida during a period of variable climate in the late Holocene. Our results indicate that coral communities dominated by reef-building Acropora palmata and Orbicella spp. persisted in the nearshore environments off southeast Florida ~75 km north of their primary historical ranges between ~3500 and 1800 years before present. This timing coincides with regional warming at the northern extent of the Atlantic Warm Pool, suggesting a likely link between regional oceanographic climate and the expansion of cold-sensitive reef-building coral communities to the high-latitude reefs off southeast Florida. These findings not only extend the record of coral-reef development in southeast Florida into the late Holocene, but they also have important implications for future range expansions of reef-building coral communities in response to modern climate change.</p