The Uniformity Factor-a Proposed Method for Expressing Variations in Specific Gravity

Existing measures of uniformity of specific gravity, as obtained by X-ray densitometry, are examined in light of how well they fulfill the requirements thought to be necessary for a uniformity indicator. Based upon an examination of mass and volume specific gravity distributions, a new indicator is proposed. This indicator, the uniformity factor, relates the volume distribution of specific gravity within an increment of wood to a selected reference base. The suitability of the uniformity factor for estimating wood uniformity is shown using data from two species of different uniformities. This approach appears to have potential as a new tool in predicting wood quality

Forecasting Influenza Outbreaks in Boroughs and Neighborhoods of New York City

The ideal spatial scale, or granularity, at which infectious disease incidence should be monitored and forecast has been little explored. By identifying the optimal granularity for a given disease and host population, and matching surveillance and prediction efforts to this scale, response to emergent and recurrent outbreaks can be improved. Here we explore how granularity and representation of spatial structure affect influenza forecast accuracy within New York City. We develop network models at the borough and neighborhood levels, and use them in conjunction with surveillance data and a data assimilation method to forecast influenza activity. These forecasts are compared to an alternate system that predicts influenza for each borough or neighborhood in isolation. At the borough scale, influenza epidemics are highly synchronous despite substantial differences in intensity, and inclusion of network connectivity among boroughs generally improves forecast accuracy. At the neighborhood scale, we observe much greater spatial heterogeneity among influenza outbreaks including substantial differences in local outbreak timing and structure; however, inclusion of the network model structure generally degrades forecast accuracy. One notable exception is that local outbreak onset, particularly when signal is modest, is better predicted with the network model. These findings suggest that observation and forecast at sub-municipal scales within New York City provides richer, more discriminant information on influenza incidence, particularly at the neighborhood scale where greater heterogeneity exists, and that the spatial spread of influenza among localities can be forecast

Seascape Genetics: A Coupled Oceanographic-Genetic Model Predicts Population Structure of Caribbean Corals

SummaryPopulation genetics is a powerful tool for measuring important larval connections between marine populations [1–4]. Similarly, oceanographic models based on environmental data can simulate particle movements in ocean currents and make quantitative estimates of larval connections between populations possible [5–9]. However, these two powerful approaches have remained disconnected because no general models currently provide a means of directly comparing dispersal predictions with empirical genetic data (except, see [10]). In addition, previous genetic models have considered relatively simple dispersal scenarios that are often unrealistic for marine larvae [11–15], and recent landscape genetic models have yet to be applied in a marine context [16–20]. We have developed a genetic model that uses connectivity estimates from oceanographic models to predict genetic patterns resulting from larval dispersal in a Caribbean coral. We then compare the predictions to empirical data for threatened staghorn corals. Our coupled oceanographic-genetic model predicts many of the patterns observed in this and other empirical datasets; such patterns include the isolation of the Bahamas and an east-west divergence near Puerto Rico [3, 21–23]. This new approach provides both a valuable tool for predicting genetic structure in marine populations and a means of explicitly testing these predictions with empirical data (Figure 1)

Monitoring the Impact of Influenza by Age: Emergency Department Fever and Respiratory Complaint Surveillance in New York City

Don Olson and colleagues report that influenza-related morbidity in NYC from 2001 to 2006 was highly age- and strain-specific and conclude that surveillance using electronic data can provide timely and representative information about the epidemiology of circulating influenza viruses

A pioneer exotic tree search for the douglas fir region

After three-quarters of a century of introduction of 152 conifer and broadleaf species, no promising candidate exotic was found for the Douglas-fir region. Growth curves spanning 50 years or longer are figured for many species. Firs, pines, larches, spruces, hemlocks, and cedars originating in northwestern North America had superior growth rates to those from other forest regions. The probable basis for these differences is discussed. The record highlights a general failure of introduced hardwoods, the slow decline of most introduced conifers, the long time needed to express failures, dramatic effects of climatic extremes or of introduced pests, failure of native species of continental origin at Wind River, striking similarities of growth rates for the species originating in each country, and many important contrasts between results from early reports and long-term conclusions.Keywords: Plant introduction, forest genetics, arboreta, conifers, silviculture, growth curves, exotics, seed movement, introduced pests, climatic extremes

Epidemiological evidence of an early wave of the 1918 influenza pandemic in New York City

The 1918 "Spanish flu" was the fastest spreading and most deadly influenza pandemic in recorded history. Hypotheses of its origin have been based on a limited collection of case and outbreak reports from before its recognized European emergence in the summer of 1918. These anecdotal accounts, however, remain insufficient for determining the early diffusion and impact of the pandemic virus. Using routinely collected monthly age-stratified mortality data, we show that an unmistakable shift in the age distribution of epidemic deaths occurred during the 1917/1918 influenza season in New York City. The timing, magnitude, and age distribution of this mortality shift provide strong evidence that an early wave of the pandemic virus was present in New York City during February-April 1918

Chemical data assimilation estimates of continental U.S. ozone and nitrogen budgets during the Intercontinental Chemical Transport Experiment-North America

Global ozone analyses, based on assimilation of stratospheric profile and ozone column measurements, and NOy predictions from the Real-time Air Quality Modeling System (RAQMS) are used to estimate the ozone and NOy budget over the continental United States during the July-August 2004 Intercontinental Chemical Transport Experiment-North America (INTEX-A). Comparison with aircraft, satellite, surface, and ozonesonde measurements collected during INTEX-A show that RAQMS captures the main features of the global and continental U.S. distribution of tropospheric ozone, carbon monoxide, and NOy with reasonable fidelity. Assimilation of stratospheric profile and column ozone measurements is shown to have a positive impact on the RAQMS upper tropospheric/lower stratosphere ozone analyses, particularly during the period when SAGE III limb scattering measurements were available. Eulerian ozone and NOy budgets during INTEX-A show that the majority of the continental U.S. export occurs in the upper troposphere/lower stratosphere poleward of the tropopause break, a consequence of convergence of tropospheric and stratospheric air in this region. Continental U.S. photochemically produced ozone was found to be a minor component of the total ozone export, which was dominated by stratospheric ozone during INTEX-A. The unusually low photochemical ozone export is attributed to anomalously cold surface temperatures during the latter half of the INTEX-A mission, which resulted in net ozone loss during the first 2 weeks of August. Eulerian NOy budgets are shown to be very consistent with previously published estimates. The NOy export efficiency was estimated to be 24%, with NOx + PAN accounting for 54% of the total NOy export during INTEX-A. Copyright 2007 by the American Geophysical Union

Rapid growth and concerted sexual transitions by a bloom of the harmful dinoflagellate Alexandrium fundyense (Dinophyceae)

© The Author(s), 2015. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The definitive version was published in Limnology and Oceanography 60 (2015): 2059–2078, doi:10.1002/lno.10155.Transitions between life cycle stages by the harmful dinoflagellate Alexandrium fundyense are critical for the initiation and termination of its blooms. To quantify these transitions in a single population, an Imaging FlowCytobot (IFCB), was deployed in Salt Pond (Eastham, Massachusetts), a small, tidally flushed kettle pond that hosts near annual, localized A. fundyense blooms. Machine-based image classifiers differentiating A. fundyense life cycle stages were developed and results were compared to manually corrected IFCB samples, manual microscopy-based estimates of A. fundyense abundance, previously published data describing prevalence of the parasite Amoebophrya, and a continuous culture of A. fundyense infected with Amoebophrya. In Salt Pond, a development phase of sustained vegetative division lasted approximately 3 weeks and was followed by a rapid and near complete conversion to small, gamete cells. The gametic period (∼3 d) coincided with a spike in the frequency of fusing gametes (up to 5% of A. fundyense images) and was followed by a zygotic phase (∼4 d) during which cell sizes returned to their normal range but cell division and diel vertical migration ceased. Cell division during bloom development was strongly phased, enabling estimation of daily rates of division, which were more than twice those predicted from batch cultures grown at similar temperatures in replete medium. Data from the Salt Pond deployment provide the first continuous record of an A. fundyense population through its complete bloom cycle and demonstrate growth and sexual induction rates much higher than are typically observed in culture.National Science Foundation Grant Number: OCE-0430724, OCE-0911031, and OCE-1314642; National Institutes of Health Grant Number: NIEHS-1P50-ES021923-01; National Park Service (NPS) Cooperative Agreement Grant Number: H238015504; Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation Grant Number: #2649 to HMS; IOF Grant Number: MOHAB PIOF-GA-25226

Age-related CNS disorder and early death in transgenic FVB/N mice overexpressing Alzheimer amyloid precursor proteins

AbstractTransgenic FVB/N mice overexpressing human (Hu) or mouse (Mo) Alzheimer amyloid precursor protein (APP695) die early and develop a CNS disorder that includes neophobia and impaired spatial alternation, with diminished glucose utilization and astrogliosis mainly in the cerebrum. Age at onset of neophobia and age at death decrease with increasing levels of brain APP. HuAPP transgenes induce death much earlier than MoAPP transgenes expressed at similar levels. No extracellular amyloid was detected, indicating that some deleterious processes related to APP overexpression are dissociated from formation of amyloid. A similar clinical syndrome occurs spontaneously in ∼20% of nontransgenic mice when they reach mid-to late-adult life, suggesting that APP overexpression may accelerate a naturally occuring age-related CNS disorder in FVB/N mice

Informing investment to reduce inequalities: a modelling approach

Background: Reducing health inequalities is an important policy objective but there is limited quantitative information about the impact of specific interventions. Objectives: To provide estimates of the impact of a range of interventions on health and health inequalities. Materials and methods: Literature reviews were conducted to identify the best evidence linking interventions to mortality and hospital admissions. We examined interventions across the determinants of health: a ‘living wage’; changes to benefits, taxation and employment; active travel; tobacco taxation; smoking cessation, alcohol brief interventions, and weight management services. A model was developed to estimate mortality and years of life lost (YLL) in intervention and comparison populations over a 20-year time period following interventions delivered only in the first year. We estimated changes in inequalities using the relative index of inequality (RII). Results: Introduction of a ‘living wage’ generated the largest beneficial health impact, with modest reductions in health inequalities. Benefits increases had modest positive impacts on health and health inequalities. Income tax increases had negative impacts on population health but reduced inequalities, while council tax increases worsened both health and health inequalities. Active travel increases had minimally positive effects on population health but widened health inequalities. Increases in employment reduced inequalities only when targeted to the most deprived groups. Tobacco taxation had modestly positive impacts on health but little impact on health inequalities. Alcohol brief interventions had modestly positive impacts on health and health inequalities only when strongly socially targeted, while smoking cessation and weight-reduction programmes had minimal impacts on health and health inequalities even when socially targeted. Conclusions: Interventions have markedly different effects on mortality, hospitalisations and inequalities. The most effective (and likely cost-effective) interventions for reducing inequalities were regulatory and tax options. Interventions focused on individual agency were much less likely to impact on inequalities, even when targeted at the most deprived communities