Survey and scoping of wildcat priority areas

This report summarises the findings of three complementary projects commissioned by SNH to inform the selection of Priority Areas for wildcat conservation; as proposed in the Scottish Wildcat Conservation Action Plan 2013. The scoping projects combined field surveys, taxonomic and genetic assessments, population modelling and a questionnaire survey of public attitudes to wildcat conservation measures. The report makes a recommendations for six wildcat Priority Areas from the nine areas pre-selected by SNH for survey. The sites recommended as Priority Areas all had evidence of cats that were classified as wildcats based on their appearance. However, domestic cats or hybrids (between domestic cats and wildcats) were also found, highlighting the need for conservation actions to reduce the risks they pose to wildcats from hybridisation and disease

Casimir forces and non-Newtonian gravitation

The search for non-relativistic deviations from Newtonian gravitation can lead to new phenomena signalling the unification of gravity with the other fundamental interactions. Various recent theoretical frameworks indicate a possible window for non-Newtonian forces with gravitational coupling strength in the micrometre range. The major expected background in the same range is attributable to the Casimir force or variants of it if dielectric materials, rather than conducting ones, are considered. Here we review the measurements of the Casimir force performed so far in the micrometre range and how they determine constraints on non-Newtonian gravitation, also discussing the dominant sources of false signals. We also propose a geometry-independent parameterization of all data in terms of the measurement of the constant c. Any Casimir force measurement should lead, once all corrections are taken into account, to a determination of the constant c which, in order to assess the accuracy of the measurement, can be compared with its more precise value known through microscopic measurements. Although the last decade of experiments has resulted in solid demonstrations of the Casimir force, the situation is not conclusive with respect to being able to discover new physics. Future experiments and novel phenomenological analysis will be necessary to discover non-Newtonian forces or to push the window for their possible existence into regions of the parameter space which theoretically appear unnatural.Comment: Also available at http://www.iop.org/EJ/abstract/1367-2630/8/10/23

Requirement for expert histopathological assessment of ovarian cancer and borderline tumours

The distinction between borderline ovarian tumours (BOT) and ovarian carcinoma is made by histopathological assessment. Of 64 patients managed according to institutional BOT protocols, 27 (42%) had been referred with a diagnosis of ovarian carcinoma that was subsequently changed to BOT following histopathological review. The 70% 6-year event-free survival of the patients with a revised diagnosis was not significantly different from those who were referred with a diagnosis of BOT. This change in diagnosis is important as it avoids the need for chemotherapy for most patients and results in patients receiving appropriate information concerning prognosis. Interestingly, 24 patients (38.1%) reported a family history of epithelial cancer, a finding that has not been reported previously.© 2000 Cancer Research Campaig

The non-thermal superbubble in IC 10 : the generation of cosmic ray electrons caught in the act

Superbubbles are crucial for stellar feedback, with supposedly high (of the order of 10 per cent) thermalization rates. We combined multiband radio continuum observations from the Very Large Array (VLA) with Effelsberg data to study the non-thermal superbubble (NSB) in IC 10, a starburst dwarf irregular galaxy in the Local Group. Thermal emission was subtracted using a combination of Balmer Hα and VLA 32 GHz continuum maps. The bubble’s nonthermal spectrum between 1.5 and 8.8 GHz displays curvature and can be well fitted with a standard model of an ageing cosmic ray electron population. With a derived equipartition magnetic field strength of 44 ±8 μG, and measuring the radiation energy density from Spitzer MIPS maps as 5±1×10−11 erg cm−3, we determine, based on the spectral curvature, a spectral age of the bubble of 1.0 ± 0.3 Myr. Analysis of the LITTLE THINGS HI data cube shows an expanding HI hole with 100 pc diameter and a dynamical age of 3.8 ± 0.3 Myr, centred to within 16 pc on IC 10 X-1, a massive stellar mass black hole (M > 23 M⊙). The results are consistent with the expected evolution for a superbubble with a few massive stars, where a very energetic event like a Type Ic supernova/hypernova has taken place about 1 Myr ago. We discuss alternatives to this interpretationPeer reviewe