Temperature dependent photoluminescence in oxygen ion implanted and rapid thermally annealed ZnO/ZnMgO multiple quantum wells

The authors investigate the effect of oxygen implantation and rapid thermal annealing in ZnO∕ZnMgOmultiple quantum wells using photoluminescence. A blueshift in the photoluminescence is observed in the implanted samples. For a low implantation dose, a significant increase of activation energy and a slight increase of the photoluminescence efficiency are observed. This is attributed to the suppression of the point defect complexes and transformation between defect structures by implantation and subsequent rapid thermal annealing. A high dose of implantation leads to lattice damage and agglomeration of defects leading to large defect clusters, which result to an increase in nonradiative recombination.The authors gratefully acknowledge the Australian Research Council for financial support and Swinburne University of Technology for Strategic Initiative funding. One of the authors X.W. acknowledges partial financial support of the Chinese National Natural Science Foundation 10364004 and the Yunnan Natural Science Foundation 2003E0013M

GP and nurses' perceptions of how after hours care for people receiving palliative care at home could be improved: a mixed methods study

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Primary health care providers play a dominant role in the provision of palliative care (PC) in Australia but many gaps in after hours service remain. In some rural areas only 19% of people receiving palliative care achieve their goal of dying at home. This study, which builds on an earlier qualitative phase of the project, investigates the gaps in care from the perspective of general practitioners (GPs) and PC nurses.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Questionnaires, developed from the outcomes of the earlier phase, and containing both structured and open ended questions, were distributed through Divisions of General Practice (1 urban, 1 rural, 1 mixed) to GPs (n = 524) and through a special interest group to palliative care nurses (n = 122) in both rural and urban areas.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Questionnaires were returned by 114 GPs (22%) and 52 nurses (43%). The majority of GPs were associated with a practice which provided some after hours services but PC was not a strong focus for most. This was reflected in low levels of PC training, limited awareness of the existence of after hours triage services in their area, and of the availability of Enhanced Primary Care (EPC) Medicare items for care planning for palliative patients. However, more than half of both nurses and GPs were aware of accessible PC resources.</p> <p>Factors such as poor communication and limited availability of after hours services were identified the as most likely to impact negatively on service provision. Strategies considered most likely to improve after hours services were individual patient protocols, palliative care trained respite carers and regular multidisciplinary meetings that included the GP.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>While some of the identified gaps can only be met by long term funding and policy change, educational tools for use in training programs in PC for health professionals, which focus on the utilisation of EPC Medicare items in palliative care planning, the development of advance care plans and good communication between members of multidisciplinary teams, which include the GP, may enhance after hours service provision for patients receiving palliative care at home. The role of locums in after PC is an area for further research</p

Nanomolar-potency 'co-potentiator' therapy for cystic fibrosis caused by a defined subset of minimal function CFTR mutants.

Available CFTR modulators provide no therapeutic benefit for cystic fibrosis (CF) caused by many loss-of-function mutations in the cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulator (CFTR) chloride channel, including N1303K. We previously introduced the concept of 'co-potentiators' (combination-potentiators) to rescue CFTR function in some minimal function CFTR mutants. Herein, a screen of ~120,000 drug-like synthetic small molecules identified active co-potentiators of pyrazoloquinoline, piperidine-pyridoindole, tetrahydroquinoline and phenylazepine classes, with EC50 down to ~300 nM following initial structure-activity studies. Increased CFTR chloride conductance by up to 8-fold was observed when a co-potentiator (termed 'Class II potentiator') was used with a classical potentiator ('Class I potentiator') such as VX-770 or GLPG1837. To investigate the range of CFTR mutations benefitted by co-potentiators, 14 CF-associated CFTR mutations were studied in transfected cell models. Co-potentiator efficacy was found for CFTR missense, deletion and nonsense mutations in nucleotide binding domain-2 (NBD2), including W1282X, N1303K, c.3700A &gt; G and Q1313X (with corrector for some mutations). In contrast, CFTR mutations G85E, R334W, R347P, V520F, R560T, A561E, M1101K and R1162X showed no co-potentiator activity, even with corrector. Co-potentiator efficacy was confirmed in primary human bronchial epithelial cell cultures generated from a N1303K homozygous CF subject. The Class II potentiators identified here may have clinical benefit for CF caused by mutations in the NBD2 domain of CFTR

Evaluation of the Efficacy and Safety of a Marine-Derived Bacillus Strain for Use as an In-Feed Probiotic for Newly Weaned Pigs

peer-reviewedForty eight individual pigs (8.7±0.26 kg) weaned at 28±1 d of age were used in a 22-d study to evaluate the effect of oral administration of a Bacillus pumilus spore suspension on growth performance and health indicators. Treatments (n = 16) were: (1) non-medicated diet; (2) medicated diet with apramycin (200 mg/kg) and pharmacological levels of zinc oxide (2,500 mg zinc/kg) and (3) B. pumilus diet (non-medicated diet + 1010 spores/day B. pumilus). Final body weight and average daily gain tended to be lower (P = 0.07) and feed conversion ratio was worsened (P<0.05) for the medicated treatment compared to the B. pumilus treatment. Ileal E. coli counts were lower for the B. pumilus and medicated treatments compared to the non-medicated treatment (P<0.05), perhaps as a result of increased ileal propionic acid concentrations (P<0.001). However, the medicated treatment reduced fecal (P<0.001) and cecal (P<0.05) Lactobacillus counts and tended to reduce the total cecal short chain fatty acid (SCFA) concentration (P = 0.10). Liver weights were lighter and concentrations of liver enzymes higher (P<0.05) in pigs on the medicated treatment compared to those on the non-medicated or B. pumilus treatments. Pigs on the B. pumilus treatment had lower overall lymphocyte and higher granulocyte percentages (P<0.001) and higher numbers of jejunal goblet cells (P<0.01) than pigs on either of the other two treatments or the non-medicated treatment, respectively. However, histopathological examination of the small intestine, kidneys and liver revealed no abnormalities. Overall, the B. pumilus treatment decreased ileal E. coli counts in a manner similar to the medicated treatment but without the adverse effects on growth performance, Lactobacillus counts, cecal SCFA concentration and possible liver toxicity experienced with the medicated treatment.The study was funded by the Higher Education Authority/Institutes of Technology Ireland Technological Sector Research Strand III Programme

Formal Verification of an Iterative Low-Power x86 Floating-Point Multiplier with Redundant Feedback

We present the formal verification of a low-power x86 floating-point multiplier. The multiplier operates iteratively and feeds back intermediate results in redundant representation. It supports x87 and SSE instructions in various precisions and can block the issuing of new instructions. The design has been optimized for low-power operation and has not been constrained by the formal verification effort. Additional improvements for the implementation were identified through formal verification. The formal verification of the design also incorporates the implementation of clock-gating and control logic. The core of the verification effort was based on ACL2 theorem proving. Additionally, model checking has been used to verify some properties of the floating-point scheduler that are relevant for the correct operation of the unit.Comment: In Proceedings ACL2 2011, arXiv:1110.447

The effect of interior heat flux on the atmospheric circulation of hot and ultra-hot Jupiters

Many hot and ultra-hot Jupiters have inflated radii, implying that their interiors retain significant entropy from formation. These hot interiors lead to an enhanced internal heat flux that impinges upon the atmosphere from below. In this work, we study the effect of this hot interior on the atmospheric circulation and thermal structure of hot and ultra-hot Jupiters. To do so, we incorporate the population-level predictions from evolutionary models of hot and ultra-hot Jupiters as input for a suite of General Circulation Models (GCMs) of their atmospheric circulation with varying semi-major axis and surface gravity. We conduct simulations with and without a hot interior, and find that there are significant local differences in temperature of up to hundreds of Kelvin and in wind speeds of hundreds of m s$^{-1}$ or more across the observable atmosphere. These differences persist throughout the parameter regime studied, and are dependent on surface gravity through the impact on photosphere pressure. These results imply that the internal evolution and atmospheric thermal structure and dynamics of hot and ultra-hot Jupiters are coupled. As a result, a joint approach including both evolutionary models and GCMs may be required to make robust predictions for the atmospheric circulation of hot and ultra-hot Jupiters.Comment: Accepted at ApJL, 17 pages, 8 figure

Robust unsupervised small area change detection from SAR imagery using deep learning

Small area change detection using synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imagery is a highly challenging task, due to speckle noise and imbalance between classes (changed and unchanged). In this paper, a robust unsupervised approach is proposed for small area change detection using deep learning techniques. First, a multi-scale superpixel reconstruction method is developed to generate a difference image (DI), which can suppress the speckle noise effectively and enhance edges by exploiting local, spatially homogeneous information. Second, a two-stage centre-constrained fuzzy c-means clustering algorithm is proposed to divide the pixels of the DI into changed, unchanged and intermediate classes with a parallel clustering strategy. Image patches belonging to the first two classes are then constructed as pseudo-label training samples, and image patches of the intermediate class are treated as testing samples. Finally, a convolutional wavelet neural network (CWNN) is designed and trained to classify testing samples into changed or unchanged classes, coupled with a deep convolutional generative adversarial network (DCGAN) to increase the number of changed class within the pseudo-label training samples. Numerical experiments on four real SAR datasets demonstrate the validity and robustness of the proposed approach, achieving up to 99.61% accuracy for small area change detection